Internship Program Study Part 1 — Paul Washer

Christ’s Victory Over Satan

But the Messiah would bruise Satan on the head. It would be a crushing blow that would destroy him. And that is something that has happened in the cross of Jesus Christ. The victory was won there. And whenever you're dealing with ideas and doctrines of the satanic, you need to realize that He is not going to be defeated.

He is defeated. He is a defeated foe.

That everything as far as work is concerned, in the greater sense, has been finished. Has been accomplished in the cross of Jesus Christ. Now someone says, well if in the cross of Jesus Christ He's a defeated foe, why does He seem to be so active?

The best way to describe Satan is a cut flower. You cut a rose. Go out here and garden, cut a rose. The moment you do, it's dead. Now it looks pretty, doesn't it? For two, three days it looks pretty. But it's dead and it is dying and it is wilting.

Satan is a cut flower. Now, it doesn't mean we need to show disrespect to principalities, powers, and dominions. But at the same time recognize that Christ is the conqueror. This is one of the greatest, most important passages in the entire book of Genesis.

Cain’s Offering and Abel’s Faith

Now, I also want to look at something very, very important. Something that's misunderstood often in Genesis 4, verses 3 through 5. And it is this. The contrast between Cain's offering and Abel's offering.

So it came about in the course of time that Cain brought an offering to the Lord, fruit of the ground. Abel on his part also brought of the firstlings of his flock and of their fat portions. And the Lord had regard for Abel and for his offering.

But for Cain and for his offering, he had no regard. So Cain became very angry and his countenance fell. Now, what is very, very important about this is that many people think wrongly. That, well, God had regard for Abel's offering because it was a sacrifice of blood.

And He had no regard for Cain's offering because Cain's offering was just the fruit of the ground. But that is not the case. In Hebrews 11, verse 4, it makes it clear that Abel offered his offering by faith.

And there seems to be a contrast in the offering. In verse 3, it says Cain brought an offering. He brought an offering. There doesn't seem to be much in it, but when you look at Abel, he brought the firstlings of his flock and of their fat portions.

It denotes that one had a faith relationship with God and the other did not. One did it as an act of worship in faith and the other one just said, I've got to do it. So there is a despising there. Also, you see that Cain kills Abel, which is the first murder.

And when you get over into 1 John and it talks about the man who hates being something like Cain who killed his own brother, the word that is used there in 1 John indicates slaughter or sacrifice. There's a possibility.

Now, you can't stand on this. This is just a possibility it seems from 1 John that since it uses in 1 John a word that seems to indicate slaughter and was often used as sacrifice, there's a possibility that what Cain did was this.

He says, alright, do you want my sacrifice? I'll give you the sacrifice. He killed his own brother. Now, you can't argue the point strongly, but it could be in John's language. The point is we have a very, very vile man.

Not a man who just made a mistake. Not a man who, why won't God accept my offering? That's not what we have. We have a very, very vile man. And the only reason his brother wasn't vile as he is the grace of God.

The grace of God.

What is that? Maybe in verse 8 it says, Cain told Abel his brother. Why is that there? What is that about? He told him what? That God didn't take my sacrifice?

Well, the idea as it leads into is it's a possibility. It literally means said to his brother. Cain said to his brother. And it came about when they were in the field. Probably the idea here is just simply it's Cain getting his brother to come out into the field.

Cain talking to his brother about this whole situation. There's probably in this somewhat of a bit of deception. Cain saying, come on out into the field with me. It is kind of unusual.

How did Cain know that God did not accept his offering? And he had accepted Abel's?

Well, in 6, when the Lord said to Cain, why are you angry? And why has your countenance fallen? We don't know how much direct revelation is going on here. It seems as though God is speaking to these people.

And we don't know if that is in an audible voice. We don't know if it's in a vision. We don't know what's going on. But there doesn't seem to be much difference between the contact that God had with Adam after the fall when he said, Adam, where are you? And conversed with him.

It seems to be the same type of thing going on here. It's rather amazing. One of the things that... Well, let's look at 4 .7. Here's something very important for all of us. It's a great passage of Scripture for the doctrine of sin.

Verse 7. If you do well, will not your countenance be lifted up? And if you do not do well, sin is crouching at the door and its desire is for you. But you must master it. Sin is portrayed as a beast.

It's personified as a beast crouching at the door and its desire is to have you, to consume you, to destroy you. And you must master it. There's also this idea here, if you do well, will not your countenance be lifted up?

It seems like from the very beginning, Cain is really doing the same thing Adam did. He's somehow blaming God. It's a pity party. You won't accept my offering. You don't like me. It goes on and on. Now, I want to tell you something.

There's an attitude, especially in the West, especially as men are less men than they ought to be. There's almost this attitude of people getting their feelings hurt and it's like, well, then I'm just going to take my ball and go home.

You know that kind of attitude that I'm talking about? Well, I'll just go home and have nobody. Here's the problem. When your pride or whatever gets offended and you get into a pity party and you want to play that game with God and you just, well, then I'll just quit.

Persevering Under Sin’s Assault

Peter said, where do we go, Lord? You alone have the words of life. When you quit God's game, you go to hell. I mean, it just doesn't work. And He doesn't come chasing after you. Like, oh, I'm sorry. Look, there's serious choices.

And He's saying, look, do well. Your countenance will be lifted up. I'm not ripping you off. I'm just... Just do what you're supposed to do. Don't get in a pity party. Just do what you're supposed to do and your countenance will be lifted up.

Now, this thing that you must master, this applies to all of us here. Sin's waiting at the door for all of us. And there's specific sins that are waiting at the door. And sins that may be waiting at the door for me may not be waiting at the door for you.

Everybody has holes in their armor. The holes in my armor and my weak spots might not even be a weakness for you. In your weak spots, I might just be oblivious to them. But the fact of the matter is all of us do.

And what I have seen, I've told many young men of God this, most men of God have certain things they must conquer before they really enter into their usefulness to God. And I've seen... I mean, it's just amazing.

There are certain things you're going to have to wrestle with you're going to have to conquer. Of course, we know the power of the Holy Spirit, the power of what God's done for us. The fact of the matter is you cannot have these hidden sins that you just kind of accept and say, well, it's just a part of who I am.

You've got to overcome them. Whether it's depression or whatever it is, it takes all sorts of forms. It can be laziness. It can be procrastination. It can be depression. It can be doubt. It can be all sorts of things.

Master it. Go out there and fight it. Overcome it. In verse 413, Cain said to the Lord, my punishment is too great to bear. Now, I want to look at something, and actually it comes from the notes in my Bible, but I was looking through here and I just thought it was absolutely amazing.

It says that Cain's sin was virtually uninterrupted. First of all, there was impiety in verse 3. There was anger in verse 5. Jealousy, deception, and murder in verse 8. Falsehood in verse 9. And self-seeking in verse 13.

I mean, he never repents. And then when his judgment comes, he doesn't repent. He just complains and tries to get the sentence reduced. So in these first few chapters of the Bible, we're just seeing basically man revealed.

Now while I'm talking, Kevin, any questions or anything,.

Just shoot your hand up. Yes? I've heard before that we're not sinners because we sin. We're sinners because we're born in Adam. I mean, that's the clearest evidence anywhere. He is just living out who he is as a descendant of Adam.

Look at Genesis 5 -3. When Adam had lived 130 years, he became the father of a son in his own likeness according to his image. Adam was created in the image of God. Adam's son was created in the image of Adam.

Fallen Adam. That's very, very true. Now, I want to point out a Hebrew... something very common in Hebrew literature that will be very helpful in Bible interpretation. It's Genesis 4 -23. Lamech said to his wives, Adah and Zillah,.

Hebrew Parallelism in Lamech’s Poem

Listen to my voice, you wives of Lamech. Give heed to my speech, for I have killed a man for wounding me and a boy for striking me. Now, here's the question. Did he kill a man and a boy? No. That's not what he's saying.

This is very important, especially in the understanding of Hebrew poetry and things like that. He's using what we call Hebrew parallelism. It's a device, and if you understand it, it is very beautiful, it's very powerful in that there's Hebrew parallelisms throughout the Hebrew Scriptures and they have different purposes, different uses, but they are primarily to emphasize and to define or explain.

The writer will write one phrase and then come back and write a phrase almost identical with a little bit of twist to it which will add emphasis or define more clearly what the first phrase says. Let me make one up for you that will sound like something out of the book of Proverbs.

The wicked shall not dwell in the land. The wicked shall be destroyed. Now, I'm saying the same thing twice for added emphasis. That's very Jewish, very Hebrew. Then what I'm doing is the second phrase is just a little bit different and it comes in and it defines or adds more meaning to the first phrase.

The wicked shall not dwell in the land. What does that mean? They're going to take a vacation? No. It comes back and says the wicked shall be destroyed.

Was Lamech being sorrowful in 24? Or was he being haughty?

Haughty is the word. Especially if we were in England. It would be the word. I mean, he is being haughty. He is being just arrogant and it just shows again the further this line of Cain goes the deeper into sin and grotesque self-will and independence.

I have killed a man. See, God would only avenge Cain 7-fold, but I'll avenge myself 77-fold. Would it be a misunderstanding to say it's almost his celebratory year? He's always bragging about it? No, he's boasting.

He's the man. And this is probably the passage upon which Jesus faces the answer to Peter. Not 7 times, but 70 times 7. He's reversing the arrogance of this man. Would it be completely different than this man?

The Sin of Self-Will and Violent Manhood

Let me tell you something. I remember when I was a little boy, you know, watching John Wayne. Okay? And, you know, John Wayne was always just the hero, the big guy, pretty clean movies, you know, clean movies, everything else, just your good old American hero guy.

Well, a few years ago I was at my mom's house and a John Wayne movie came on and my mom was watching it and I sat down and I thought, well, I'll watch television in a while. I'll watch John Wayne. I almost puked my guts out.

No, there wasn't naked women and no, there wasn't immorality, but he was a seething cauldron of flesh. Of this. You know, I'm so-and-so. You mess with me, I'll kill you. I mean, it was just flesh. It was just wicked flesh.

I mean, you could watch it as a kid thinking, man, this guy's really something. He's a good guy and everything, but when you look at it, just a man who walked independently of God so He thought, I do what I want, I'll take the lives of others in my hand.

Do not honor a violent man. Do not seek to be like him, the Bible tells us. And we see this and we're so blind to it because the great sin of sins is self-will, doing things your own way. Who are you?

You don't deserve this. You are a slave. Who are you to decide where you're going to live, where you're going to work, what you're going to do with your money? It's not anything. You don't even own your socks.

The Sons of God and the Coming Flood

Let's look at Genesis 6. Genesis 6, 1 -4. We have a really amazing text here. Now, it came about when men began to multiply on the face of the land and daughters were born to them and the sons of God saw that the daughters of men were beautiful and they took wives for themselves whomever they chose.

Then the Lord said, My spirit will not strive with men forever. We have this thing of who are these sons of God? Who are these daughters of men? And it has been taught by many people down through the ages that this is sexual relationships between angels and people and that as a result, the Nephilim came upon the face of the earth who were mighty men of renown.

Well, the problem is it says the Nephilim were on the earth before and after this. So the Nephilim are not the result of some union between angelic beings and human beings. I honestly believe... Also, some believe that the passage in Jude refers to this, but I don't think that's the case grammatically that it has to at all.

I think what's going on here is that the sons of God is referring to the line of... Who do you think? Seth. Not our Seth with us today, but another one. And the daughters of men refer to what? Cain. Now, what's going on here is this.

As you look through, before this passage starts, preceding this passage, there is these two distinct lines we see. One of them is very ungodly and the other one has some godliness. They're calling on the name of the Lord.

Their ancestors are walking with God, at least some of them. And there seems to be a division and a remnant and some salt on the earth. God told Abraham, if I find even ten righteous men in Sodom, I will not destroy it.

But what happens? Here at 6, I believe what you see is these lines cross. Because after this you see what? In chapter 6, verse 5,. Then the Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great on the earth and that every intent of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continuously.

And then it's a precursor into the flood. And I think that what had happened was there was just this convergence of the two lines. There's no godliness left in the land. And there was destruction. Destruction.

Providence, Human Depravity, and God’s Grief

Now, what does all this teach us? Did God's plan fail so He destroys everybody and starts all over? No, there is no failing in the decrees of God. In the great mystery of Providence, man freely chose to do all the things he did.

But in the great mystery of Providence, God was directing this. And all of this, even though men are totally responsible and God is not the author of sin, all this scenario that we see is one more necessary portion in the education of the church.

I believe God's done everything He's done for His Christ and for the people of His Christ. And everything written in this book was decreed and designed in order to teach us. And what does this teach us?

Apart from the grace of God working on this planet, it will run headlong into just abject moral corruption beyond salvation. That men are really evil. And that's the thing that no one understands. All the problem in the Southern Baptist Convention, it's not about particular atonement.

It's not about election. Do you know what the problem is about? How the whole thing could be solved with answering one question, is man really depraved? Because when you answer that question, everything else falls through.

And that's what Scripture is constantly screaming to us about. Now, I want us to go to 6 .6 really quick. The Lord was sorry that He had made man on the earth and He was grieved in His heart. There are some in the Reformed view who would take this passage and really twist it.

Really twist it. That God cannot be grieved. And they have a good thing. I know what they're trying to do. If God can be grieved, then it's like something outside of God is determining how God is going to be.

Do you see what they're trying to do? They're trying to protect this idea of God, His all-sufficiency, His sovereignty, His power, His providence. But it's just not necessary. If it says God was grieved, God was grieved.

In fact, the matter is, God is in a reciprocal relationship. He's in a real, genuine relationship with men. He really does love men. He really is all-sovereign. He's immutable. And no one is over Him or can manipulate Him or change Him.

But at the same time, He's in a real relationship. It is a reciprocal relationship. And yes, He grieves over sin. The Holy Spirit can be grieved. So be very careful that you don't violate Scripture in an attempt to protect God.

You don't need to protect God. You just need to proclaim what's there in Scripture. Now, again, if there are any questions as I'm talking, just let me know. Now, I want us to look at something very important in 6 -9.

These are the records of the generations of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his time. Noah walked with God. Now, do you honestly think that Noah was saved for his own piety? If he was, he's the first man and last one in history to do so.

There was a sense in which what? Noah was that remnant God had. That Noah was indeed, as men go, a righteous man. That he was a God-fearing man. But he was so by the grace of God, number one. And number two, it is that same grace that locked Noah up in that boat.

Because as soon as he gets out of that boat, Noah gets drunk. What I want you to see is that so many people, I mean, so many people in our churches believe that Noah was God's last hope. That praise Noah, God was able to find a man so that the world wouldn't be destroyed.

If there is one man left, that the world not be totally destroyed and the line of men cut off, it's because God preserved that man by His own grace. Noah should have died as well as the rest of his family.

Covenant Blessing and the Children of Believers

Now, I also want you to see something. 618. But I will establish My covenant with you and you shall enter the ark, you and your sons and your wife and your sons' wives with you. Now, I am not Presbyterian, even though I love many Presbyterian brothers and everything like that.

So I'm not going to take a view of infant baptism and I'm not going to take a view of this strong idea of covenant and children and all of the such. But I do want you to understand something. If you look especially throughout the patriarchs, you see that God blesses those associated with His elect.

God saved Noah's family associated with Noah. If you look at God's blessing on Lot, it was because of His association with Abraham. Now, I want to look just really quickly at Jeremiah 32, verse 38. They shall be My people and I will be their God and I will give them one heart and one way that they may fear Me always for their own good and for the good of their children after them.

Now, you say, well, this has to do with Israel. Yes, but it's the New Covenant of which we're part. This is a passage all theologians, exegetes, students of Old Testament, New Testament recognize that this is a prophecy regarding the New Covenant.

And look what it says. He says that they may fear Me always for their own good and for the good of their children after them. That does not mean that the believer's children are going to be saved. But what it does mean is this.

There is a sense in which the believer could say I have more hope than most for my children. There is. Not that they're all elect because they're part of the family of a believer. No. But what it does mean is this.

That child stands a greater chance coming under the influence of the Gospel and the blessings of it than they ever would in an ungodly family. And it does. There is something there that's even more important that no one can put their finger on.

God has promised throughout Scripture, He promises to do good to the children of His people. And what I don't want you to do is I don't want you to go to one extreme and say, well, you'll be saved and your household.

That's not what that promise means. As a matter of fact, if you want to talk about the blessing on your household because you've become a Christian, this is a passage you can draw from. So, you know, do good to you and your children.

For the sake of you and your children. There is a mystery in the providence of God and in His degrees and in His sovereignty. But at the same time, I want you to recognize that He has made promises. You can be very haughty.

Like you hear these TV evangelists and they're like, you bless me and God will bless you type thing. That's just such an abomination. But brother, there is a sense in which if you truly walk with God, even people associated with you will be blessed.

Even family members will be blessed. There is a real sense in that. There is. If you look at the line of Jonathan Edwards, have you ever seen that work on that? They take Jonathan Edwards and then a great criminal or ungodly man of his time and they compare both lineages.

It's absolutely phenomenal. Out of the line of Jonathan Edwards comes ministers, missionaries, educators, congressmen, presidents. I mean, it's unbelievable. And again, hold this in a balance. What I'm saying is it's not a sure guarantee that everyone that's around you and your family and they're all going to walk with God and be blessed, but at the same time, it means more than nothing.

So hold that in a balance. My goodness, the time is just getting away from us. I want to look at a few more things. Something very important. Genesis 7 -11, just quickly. In the 600th year of Noah's life in the second month on the 17th day of the month and on the same day, all the fountains of the great deep burst open and the floodgates of the sky were opened.

The Cataclysmic Scope of the Flood

Most people's idea of the Exodus comes from Cecil B. DeMille's Ten Commandments and not the Bible. Well, most people's idea of the flood comes from old films like Noah and stuff. And we think, and the rain came down.

Well, the rain did come down. But the water, it wasn't just it rained, folks. I mean, the fountains of the deep burst open. Cataclysmic geological events. I mean, I don't know... Springs broke open, mountains, maybe the tops of them blew off.

I mean, everything you can possibly imagine. You know, there is a ton of water under the land. You know that. I mean, it all broke forth. It wasn't just the world flooded because some rain fell down. It flooded because, I mean, the fountains of the deep broke open.

And much of the geological, all that we have, record and things, not seem to, give great evidence towards these things. You know, the Grand Canyon, for example. Well, it took billions and millions and gazillions of years.

When Mount St. Helens blew up, in a matter of seconds, it made a canyon that scientists totally ignore because they would normally be saying it took millions and millions of years to create this thing.

No, it didn't. It took about a few seconds. And all the upheaval, I think, that we see in this world, all the geological upheaval, all this stuff, what you need to understand is it wasn't just little stories about little kids singing about the rain came down.

I mean, it was like the world split open. The seams of the land split open in a million places. And water comes busting forth. When we get into creation, I'll hopefully bring some films in here and let us watch some guys who really know what they're doing with regard to this.

But that's something that I want you to see. Also, 719 -20, the water prevailed more and more upon the earth so that all the high mountains everywhere under the heavens were covered. The water prevailed 15 cubits higher and the mountains were covered.

All flesh that moved on the earth. The point about this passage, I want you to see, many people say it's not necessary to say universal flood because you can look at things like the water prevailed more and more upon the earth.

It could be land. But it is harder with this passage. It is harder to say that the flood wasn't universal than just to accept the language that in fact it was universal. It was universal. And John MacArthur makes a great point again.

His study Bible is so good. It really is so good. It makes a point. It's under heaven. I mean, it was a complete cleansing of the earth. And it really is universal in scope. Now, I want us to look at 21 -23 quickly.

All flesh that moved on the earth. And it talks about birds and cattle, beasts, every swarming thing, and all mankind. Folks, there is a sense in which you look at this and go, my goodness, the severity of God.

Yes, the severity, but the mercy and the economy of the thing. When you look at man as an eternal soul and you look at the fact that all flesh within just a few generations becomes so corrupt, everything needs to be destroyed.

If you can't see the mercy in Him providing a family to remain, Noah, you're blind. You don't understand how wicked men are. If God had destroyed absolutely everybody on the face of the earth, including Noah, He would not have had to give one explanation for what He did.

But the fact that He spared somebody is why He has to give an explanation. We wicked men look at what God did and say, you killed all those people. That's not right. Heaven looks at God and says, you saved one of them.

That's not right. Do you see the difference? The explanation is not necessary if God destroys absolutely every living thing on the face of the earth. It provides no means of redemption whatsoever. There's no need for an explanation.

The need for an explanation comes when God shows mercy. And that's something that I want you to see that's extremely important.

Creation’s Federal Headship and the Judgment of the Flood

Now, yes? The land animals, was that part of judgment or was it incidental? And if so, why were all the fish just exempt?

Well, we don't really know. We do know this. Some guys possibly take this too far. You've heard of the idea of federal head. Adam is our federal head. It's the idea that Adam was made head over all of mankind.

But there's a sense in which over all things. Because that goes back to when we get to Romans 5. How is it right that God would impute the sin of Adam to every one of His offspring? The fact of the matter is He was made federal head and when He fell, He took with Him all of His race, but at the same time, all of creation.

Everything was confined. In Romans 8, we understand that everything was subjected to futility. Now, why the fish were spared? Anybody guess. Yes. The fact of it is creation itself, everything with breath in its nostrils, died except what was on that boat.

Noah, David, and the Danger of Spiritual Complacency

Now, one thing before we go on to Matthew that's very important for you and I want you to see this. It's very important for me. 9 .21, speaking of Noah, he drank of the wine and became drunk and uncovered himself inside his tent.

Now, what's so important about this? Well, you can add 2 Samuel 11, 1 -4. David and Bathsheba. You say, well, what does David and Bathsheba and Noah have to do together? Well, Noah had experienced this great victory.

He was tremendously used of God. He had gone through the battle. He had fought the fight. He had done what he had to do. He was mightily used of God. It was over. He could now rest. Just rest. He had done what he was called to do.

Just rest. David is the one who goes out and fights all the battles of Israel. He does it as a young man. Now he's middle-aged. He's a king. It's time for everyone to go out and fight. He stays back in Jerusalem.

He's already done the work he needs to do as a man. He can just rest on his laurels and he falls. If you were to go back through the history of preachers and preaching, you'd find this happens so many times it would terrify you.

Preachers usually don't fall when they're young. They usually don't fall when they're young and zealous and want to be used of the Lord and want to fight the Lord's battles and want to do all these things.

They fall after they've been mightily used of the Lord and they drop their guard and they begin to think that they're some kind of privileged person on the face of the earth because they've been so used of God and they don't have to really follow all the rules anymore that everyone else has to follow.

You see what I'm saying? Guys, it's all throughout history. It's all throughout history. So usually young guys full of zeal want to fight the Lord's battles and they want to be used. But it's later on in life.

Now, any time you look at any older, middle-aged, a minister who's reached about 50 on and he looks like he doesn't want to do anything anymore, pray for him. He's in a dangerous position. But more than that, have pity.

Why? Some guys are like that because they've been like that all their life. Other guys are like that because literally they've poured themselves out unto death. They're burned out and there's nothing left.

And they know it. And part of it is our system of sending one man to a finely mowed yard with a really nice brick building full of devils. And so when you see a guy wore out like that, it might not be because he's just never been zealous or he's never loved the Lord.

He may be loved the Lord more than you do or ever have. But he's just eaten alive. Burned out. And yay, now he doesn't even care. He's just in survival mode. It happens. It happens. And it happens to all of us to some degree.

It really does. Now, let's get over to the New Testament real quick. On Matthew's genealogy, I believe what's going on here is Matthew's genealogy is traced through Joseph, Jesus' legal father. And Luke's genealogy in chapter 3 is traced through Mary, his blood relative.

The Virgin Birth and Joseph’s Righteousness

Now, why is it this way in Matthew? In Matthew, it was basically written to Jews. It was basically written to Jews. And it was important to trace this through Jesus' legal father. But Luke was written to Gentiles and it even was known among the Gentiles to trace genealogies through women.

And so if there are differences, I believe it can be attributed basically to that. I want you to look at verse 16 in chapter 1. The very careful language here. Jacob was the father of Joseph, the husband of Mary by whom Jesus was born.

Do you see the very careful language there? Very, very important. Very important. Now, let me share with you something. One of the most asinine things you can do on the face of the earth. I mean it is literally a logical absurdity.

There is nothing hardly under the sun more stupid than this. And it is this. To say you believe in God, yet you can't accept the virgin birth. Or what you're really saying, to say you believe in God, but you don't believe in miracles.

It's asinine. Now, an atheist who says, I don't believe in God, I don't believe in miracles, he's logically consistent. I believe he's wrong, but his logic is fine. His premise, he begins on a wrong foundation, but his logic is good.