God Bless America with Repentance

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Would you open your Bibles with me this morning? We will be in Romans chapter 1, and we're going to begin by reading the Word of God.
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We're going to read quite a bit of Scripture this morning as it all speaks to the subject of the morning.
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We're going to read Romans 1, verses 18-32, for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.
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For what can be known about God is plain to them, because God has shown it to them.
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For His invisible attributes, namely His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world and the things that have been made.
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So they are without excuse.
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For although they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks to Him, but became futile in their thinking, and their foolish hearts were darkened.
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Claiming to be wise, they became fools, and exchanging the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.
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Therefore, God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshipped and served the creature rather than the Creator, who is blessed forever.
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Amen.
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For this reason, God gave them up to dishonorable passions, for their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature.
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And the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another.
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Men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.
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And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind.
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To do what ought not to be done, they were filled with all manner of unrighteousness, evil, covetousness, malice.
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They were full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness.
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They are gossips, slanderers, haters of God, insolent, haughty, boastful, inventors of evil, disobedient to parents, foolish, faithless, heartless, ruthless.
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Though they know God's decree that those who practice such things deserve to die, they not only do them, but give approval to those who practice them.
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Father in Heaven, I thank You for Your Word.
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I thank You for Your truth.
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And I pray that this morning, that the message will be faithful to the truth.
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And I pray that You would keep me from error, as I am certainly a fallible man and capable of error.
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And I pray that You would open the hearts of Your people to the truth, that Your Word would go forth and would be used to convict and to convert and to be the reminder of our need to pray for our nation.
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In Jesus' name we pray and for His sake, Amen.
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Please be seated.
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This past Friday, we had the annual celebration of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence and the birth of the United States of America.
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The men who founded this country believed in personal liberty.
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They rejected the monarchy and they demanded individual freedom.
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This nation was built on the ideal of personal independence.
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However, those same men did not believe that such independence relieved a person from his responsibilities to his Creator.
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In fact, the Creator Himself is invoked in many of our founding documents, not the least of which is the Declaration of Independence itself.
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It says, we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal and are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights.
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One could say that our founding fathers consented to a separation between the church and the state, but they never conceived of a division between God and government.
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George Washington, our founding father, first president said, and I quote, of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, religion and morality are indispensable, end quote.
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And just in case you're wondering which religion he is espousing, he is also believed to have said, it is impossible to rightly govern without God and the Bible.
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So it is clear which religion he is invoking.
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John Adams also said, our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people.
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It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
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Adams also said that the 4th of July ought to be commemorated as the day of deliverance by solemn acts of devotion to Almighty God.
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These men fought for and bled for independence from the British, but not from independence from God.
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The problem is that here we are over 200 years later and we have reached a point in our nation wherein society as a whole and in general is demanding independence from God and in fact rebelling against Him.
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As a result, we have seen an entire generation which is actively engaging in a level of moral depravity which would have been beyond anything our founding fathers could have ever imagined and things that even a generation ago would have been unspoken.
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Who would have believed a generation ago that a person could be forced by law to undergo mental re-education? It's titled sensitivity training, but it's mental re-education.
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For choosing to not bake a cake for a homosexual couple that was wanting to be married in a state where homosexual marriage is not legal.
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The baker is not only being forced to do the work or lose his business, but he's also being forced to take training, mental re-education training for having chosen not to do this thing.
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Who would have believed a generation ago that schools would be forced to allow boys into the girls' locker room because they, quote, identify as girls, end quote.
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Who would have believed a generation ago that a film would be made that was meant to not only soften the issue of abortion, but to make it a joke, a comedy about abortion is coming out.
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Now, I want to be clear.
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I'm not saying that things were perfect a generation ago.
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I'm not saying that the 50s is the grand scheme of life and it was the perfect generation.
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I'm sorry for those who might think that it is.
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It wasn't perfect.
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Men were sinners in the 50s and they're still sinners today.
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But there are obviously, as Al Mohler has said, a massive moral revolution which is occurring in our nation right before our very eyes.
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What once was lauded as virtuous is now considered heinous.
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And what once was considered heinous is now being glorified as virtuous.
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We have become the Isaiah 520 generation where Isaiah in that verse says, Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness, who put bitter for sweet and sweet for bitter.
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I mean, honestly, if this verse does not describe the current nature of our culture, then what could it describe? We have a president who goes before the leaders of Planned Parenthood, one of the most murderous groups in history, and says, thank you and God bless you.
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We have a media which will spend weeks glorifying an athlete who comes out of the closet while they, with the same mouth, vilify one who has the audacity to display his faith in Christ.
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The pronouncement of woe in Scripture is a pronouncement of judgment.
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And when the Bible says, Woe to those who call evil good and good evil, it is a pronouncement of judgment and beloved judgment is here.
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Judgment isn't coming.
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Judgment has come and we are reaping the benefits thereof.
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We are seeing what some theologians and Christian commentators have noted is the downward progression which is described in Romans chapter 1.
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What happens when a people reject God and turn to idols? The Bible says they are given over to a debased mind.
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So today I want us to study Romans chapter 1.
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We're going to discuss the progression of the text.
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Certainly we will not be able to dig into every sentence because we're looking at a larger section of text this morning.
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But I want to show how the progression of thought in this text follows almost in lockstep with the downward spiral which our society is undergoing.
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So, let us begin.
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We're going to go to Romans 1, back to verse 18.
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As we begin, I want to set the context for us.
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It's important, again, as we study, we need to understand the context.
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Romans, this is what we're studying in our Dads and Dudes program because I believe that Romans is so important in understanding of systematic theology.
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And one of the things that we have to understand, this is Paul's magnum opus.
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This is his great systematic theology that he's provided to the church.
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And he's laying out for us Christian theology.
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And after he gives his introductions in chapter 1, in verse 1, all the way down to verse 15, he's providing introductions, talking about who he's speaking to and his thankfulness for them and his prayers for them.
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He gets to verse 15 and he says that he's eager to preach the gospel to those who are in Rome.
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And then in verse 16, he gives the thesis of the book.
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The thesis of Romans is verses 16 and 17.
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He says, For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek.
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For in it, that is, in the gospel, the righteousness of God is revealed from faith.
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For faith, as it is written, the righteous shall live by faith.
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This passage was used by Martin Luther to be one of his strongest arguments for the doctrine of sola fide.
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The doctrine of justification by faith alone.
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The article upon which the church stands or falls, according to Luther.
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He said this is the truth upon which the church will stand or the church will fall.
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And that is the truth of justification by faith alone.
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So after Paul has made this argument in verse 17, he then shifts his attention in the next section and it goes on through chapter 3.
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He shifts his attention to the wrath of God.
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And particularly, he will be stressing the sin of humanity which deserves God's wrath.
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And he's going to be demonstrating that all people are sinners and that all people are deserving of God's wrath.
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Remember, his focus in verse 15, he says, is the gospel.
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He's eager to preach the gospel.
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The gospel is the power of God and the salvation.
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What does gospel mean? It means good news.
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But here's the thing that we must understand.
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You cannot understand the gospel.
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You cannot understand the good news of the cross.
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You cannot understand the good news of Christ until you first understand that you are a desperate sinner, worthy of God's punishment.
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In fact, R.C.
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Sproul said it like this, until we understand the prior revelation of the wrath of God, we will never get excited about the revelation of the grace of God.
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I think that's so true.
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We will never understand or get excited.
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We'll never be able to call grace amazing until we understand completely how much we deserve wrath.
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So, the Apostle Paul is intent on explaining this wrath to us.
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Now, in verse 18, he says the wrath of God is revealed from heaven.
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I want to make a point because the wrath that he is going to express, there's actually different ways which God's wrath is expressed in the world.
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If you're taking notes, you can mark these down.
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We talk about God's wrath in different ways.
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One of the ways we talk about God's wrath is God's eternal wrath.
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If a person dies apart from Jesus Christ, they die in their sin, they experience the eternal wrath of God, wherein His grace is completely removed, they are consigned to utter torment forever.
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That's eternal wrath.
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We also have something we call the wrath of consequence.
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The wrath of consequence is you reap what you sow.
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If you do something negative and something negative happens, that's a consequence of your action, and that's built-in wrath.
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We talk about those things that we do.
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If a person is sexually promiscuous and they contract a disease as a result of their promiscuity, that's a built-in wrath.
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It's built into the action.
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If a person drinks all their life and gets liver disease, it's a built-in wrath, you see.
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It's there.
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That's what we call the wrath of consequence.
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And it's built-in.
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So we have God's eternal wrath.
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We have God's wrath of consequence.
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But we have also what John MacArthur has described as the wrath of abandonment.
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The wrath of abandonment is when God removes His hand of restraint.
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He removes His grace of restraint from a people and allows them to go off into their wanton sin.
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That's the wrath that's being described here.
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As we will see, when people run off into idols and God removes His hand of restraint, the result is moral depravity.
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So that's what we'll see as we break down this lesson.
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We're going to look at three parts today.
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We're going to look first at the universal knowledge of God.
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Then we're going to look at the natural idolatry of man.
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And then we're going to see the consequences of God's abandonment.
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So let's look first at the universal knowledge of God.
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Romans 1.18 For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who by their unrighteousness suppress the truth.
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Alright, that's the first section.
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That sort of sets the stage for the rest of this chapter.
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Paul is saying here that there is something that God has revealed from heaven against all unrighteousness and ungodliness of men.
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There's something that God has shown from heaven.
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Now that word revealed is important because God's revelation comes to us in two different ways.
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We have what we call general revelation, and then we have what we call special revelation.
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General revelation is what all people receive.
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When you look up into the heavens and you see all the stars and all the glorious clouds and the beauty of the earth and the world around you, that's general revelation.
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You know what the Bible says? That should tell you that God exists.
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The heavens declare the glory of God and the firmament above His handiwork.
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You look out at the world and no one should be an atheist.
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No one should be able to look at the glory of the world and the universe and say, yeah, this all happened by accident.
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This was nothing but gas and particles and all just kind of clanged together and banged together and it all exploded and boom! You've got a beautiful thing called life.
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Yeah, that makes sense.
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Not.
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But that's the idea.
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That should lead us to an understanding that God exists.
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That's what we call general revelation.
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That's a revelation that comes to everyone generally.
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What is special revelation? Special revelation is God's Word.
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This is something that God intervened in history to give us.
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When Moses spoke to God at the burning bush, that was special revelation.
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When Jesus was there being baptized and you heard from heaven, this is my beloved Son in whom I am well pleased.
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That's special revelation.
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That was a direct intervention wherein God opens up the divide and speaks into the world.
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We call that special revelation.
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OK? So there's general revelation and special revelation.
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And when Paul says here, the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all unrighteousness and all ungodliness of men, this is general revelation.
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How do I know that? Well, I want to show you in chapter 2.
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Turn with me in chapter 2 to Romans and go to verse 14.
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For when Gentiles who do not have the law by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves even though they do not have the law.
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They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them on that day when according to my gospel God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.
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What is this passage telling us? It's telling us that the law of God, the moral law of God, is written on the hearts of men.
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There is a natural understanding of right and wrong which God has given to all people.
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This is a general revelation to the conscience.
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In fact, the conscience itself is what tells us and helps us to understand right from wrong.
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Think about laws and how laws are based.
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They are based mostly on human moral principles such as do not murder, do not lie, do not steal.
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But where do morals come from? You know, this is actually a big problem for the evolutionists.
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Because according to evolutionary theory, morals are a bad thing.
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Because in evolutionary theory, a moral would cause a person to do things which might not perpetuate his own life.
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Like morally, I might jump on a grenade to save someone else.
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Right? That's not the survival of the fittest in the sense of me trying to survive.
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That's not anything.
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That's a paradox for the evolutionists.
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That we would have this internal virtue, this desire to do the right and to avoid the wrong.
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You see, this is a natural thing that God puts inside of us called a conscience.
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It's also what brings about guilt.
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You ever see a child do something wrong and then feel guilty about it? Did you have to teach them to feel guilty? Do you have to teach your children to feel wrong? No, it's a natural thing within us that God has placed there.
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And yes, we're totally depraved.
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Yes, we're moral depravity.
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But that doesn't eliminate what God has put in our heart.
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It's there.
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And it's general revelation because it comes to us all.
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So what do we do with it? This is Paul's issue.
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We suppress it.
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We know the truth.
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We know right from wrong, at least on a basic level.
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But what do we do with it? We suppress it in unrighteousness.
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Just read on.
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It says in verse one, it says, The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who, what? By their unrighteousness suppress the truth.
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The word suppress, it's an interesting word in the Greek.
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It means to hold back something which is under pressure.
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It means to hold down something which is trying to come out.
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You see, the truth is within us and it's trying to press its way out.
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But we suppress it with unrighteousness and we cover it up with our ungodliness.
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You know why this is? This is why drugs and alcohol are so prevalent in the adolescent, teenage and younger adult years.
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Because it is in those ages wherein we start to become very cognizant of our guilt when we do something wrong.
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It's in those ages where we begin to understand the moral unrighteousness of the things that we're doing and how can we lift our restraint? Well, there's nothing better than drugs and alcohol.
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What are they called? Uninhibitors.
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They take away our inhibitions.
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What is an inhibition? An inhibition is a natural restriction.
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What does drugs and alcohol do? It eliminates your natural restrictions.
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It eliminates your inhibitions.
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It helps suppress what you know is right so that you can glorify in what you know is wrong.
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People suppress the truth in unrighteousness, but that does not mean the truth is not there.
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Verse 19, For what can be known about God is plain to them because God has shown it to them.
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All people in general have been shown the truth.
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Verse 20, For His invisible attributes, namely His eternal power and divine nature, have been clearly perceived ever since the creation of the world in the things that have been made.
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So they are without excuse.
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Again, as I said already, the creation, the universe, all these things show to the world that God exists.
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But what do people do with that knowledge that's in them? What do people do with the knowledge that's all around them? They suppress it in unrighteousness.
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They use everything they can to suppress it in unrighteousness because they would prefer their unrighteousness to God's righteousness.
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They want that, so the only way to do it is to pack it down with their unrighteousness.
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The universe itself is testimony of the existence of God, and the conscience bears witness to that testimony, and that's why the Apostle Paul says they are without excuse.
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No man will be able to face God on Judgment Day.
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I heard an atheist once, he said, he was asked the question, what will you do if you die, you find out God exists, and he asks you, why didn't you obey me? The atheist response was, you didn't give me enough evidence of your existence.
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What foolishness, one.
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But also, what a demonstration of utter rebellion.
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What a demonstration of suppression.
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To be able to utter the words, God, you haven't done enough to show me you exist.
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It's amazing, it's amazing thought.
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That's suppression, by the way.
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Man is not universally ignorant of God.
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Man is universally rebellious against God.
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That's what gives me confidence in speaking to atheists or anyone else.
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I know the truth is there.
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I know they're suppressing it.
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I don't have to wonder.
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The Bible tells me that's what they're doing.
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It's not a matter of telling them something they don't already know.
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My words agree with their conscience.
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Their brain is suppressing the truth that their conscience knows is right.
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So my goal is simply to remove the restraint and let that which is being suppressed spring forth.
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That's my goal in evangelism.
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That's my goal in sharing the gospel.
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It's my goal in speaking to the unbeliever.
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It's to tell them what they already know is true.
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So that their conscience will bear witness with my words.
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So we see there is a universal knowledge of God.
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But, we move to part two.
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There is a natural idolatry in men.
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Look at verse 21.
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For although they knew God...
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The apostle has no doubt.
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They knew God.
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For although they knew God, they did not honor Him as God or give thanks to Him, but they became futile in their thinking and their foolish hearts were darkened.
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Claiming to be wise, they became fools.
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Boy, doesn't that just ring true to today.
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How many people do you know that are atheists who say, Well, I'm an atheist because I'm so smart, I'm so intelligent, I'm so wise.
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I remember a man...
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I remember where I was when I was sharing about Jesus with a man and he said, I don't believe that, I'm too smart, I just know too much.
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Claiming to be wise, they became fools.
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And exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images resembling mortal man and birds and animals and creeping things.
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This is the natural state of man.
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The natural response of man to the knowledge that God exists is not obedience to God, but rather the desire to replace God with something else.
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I remember a while back, somebody asked me, How can you say no one seeks for God when all these people seem to be seeking for God? And my answer was, What do men do? They don't seek the God of the Bible.
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What do they do? They seek gods that they themselves create.
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When you create God, guess who's God? Who's the creator? You are.
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So who's the God? You are.
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Man is incurably religious.
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I will never, ever deny that.
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Man is incurably religious, but he's also incurably rebellious.
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As a result, he focuses his religious attention on anything and everything he can other than God.
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As a result, his heart becomes darkened and his wisdom becomes foolishness.
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We are all sinners because of Adam.
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This is a natural effect in us all.
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We all have a tendency to replace God with something else.
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We don't think correctly.
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It says here, it says our wisdom becomes foolishness.
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There's something called the noetic effect of the fall.
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And it's not Noah like Noah in the Ark.
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It's noetic.
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N-O-E-T-I-C.
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Sorry, I know some of you are writing and I want to make sure I tell you.
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The noetic effect.
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Noetic refers to the mental or pertaining to the mind.
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Sinful man is capable of thinking deep thoughts and even brilliant thoughts.
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But so long as his thoughts are clouded by his sin nature, they will always be obscured by humanistic presuppositions.
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This is why brilliant scholars can look at the Bible's truths and deny them or ignore them.
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This is why scientists can see the obvious signs of design in creation and ignore it and reject it.
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Because there's something wrong in our brain because of the fall.
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We have a noetic effect from the fall.
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Man rejects the knowledge which is inherent and he replaces it with an allegiance to something that he has created.
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Sometimes it's obvious.
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Sometimes he creates an idol out of wood.
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Sometimes he creates an idol out of metal or stone.
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Those are pretty obvious.
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You say, yeah, that guy's an idolater because he's worshipping a stone or he's worshipping a wood or he's worshipping a carved piece of metal, something.
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Yeah, he's an idolater.
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But sometimes idolatry is not so obvious because some people are covertly idolatrous.
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Sometimes they worship their own wealth quietly.
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Sometimes they worship their own wisdom.
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I've met quite a few men who worship at the throne of their own brilliance.
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Some worship in secret their own lusts and their own desires.
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Beloved, this is all idolatry.
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It's just replacing God with something else.
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And the truth is all sin is idolatry because all sin is replacing the commands of God with something else.
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It's all idolatry.
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When a man steals, he is exchanging what should be a desire for God for a desire for something material.
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When a man lusts, he's exchanging what should be a desire for God for a desire for some type of physical pleasure.
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When a man lies, he's exchanging the truth of God and obedience to God with commitment to deception.
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All of this is idolatry.
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It's exchanging.
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That's why that word exchange in the text is so important.
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They exchange the truth for a lie.
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They exchange God for something else.
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And when man runs towards idolatry, there will come a time for an individual and for society as a whole.
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When God will choose to give them over to that rebellion.
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And this is where Paul goes starting in verse 24.
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The consequences of the abandonment.
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Verse 24.
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Therefore, God gave them up.
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Just stop right there.
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Is there any more frightening thing in all the world that God is willing to lift His hand from a person? Is there anything more frightening in all the world that God would give someone over? And yet Paul uses the same phrase the same way three times in this text.
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God gave them up.
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They ran into their idolatry and God let them run.
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He says, therefore, God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts.
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Hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves.
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Because, why did He do it? Because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie.
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They worshipped and served the creature rather than the creator who is blessed forever.
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They exchanged the truth for a lie.
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They became idolaters.
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They sought after other gods.
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They sought after their own wisdom, their own knowledge, their own worthiness, their own selves.
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They sought after this thing.
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They exchanged God for something else and as a result, God gave them over.
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Beloved, I want to share with you something.
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If you want to say there is a thesis for today's message, here it is.
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People often say that rampant immorality is the cause of the judgment of God.
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But it is not.
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Rampant immorality is the result of the judgment of God.
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Because when God gives someone up, the natural result, according to this text, is that they run off into their moral depravity.
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Hear it again, because it is so important.
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Therefore, God gave them up in the lusts of their hearts to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie, and worshipped and served the creature rather than the creator who is blessed forever.
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Amen.
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And it goes on in verse 26 to say this.
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For this reason, God gave them up.
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Same construction in the Greek.
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Same phrase.
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God gave them up to dishonorable passions.
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What happens when God releases his hand of restraint? Moral depravity.
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It didn't bring God's judgment.
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It is God's judgment.
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It's the result of the idolatry.
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It's the result of turning from God.
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When a people turn from God and God lifts his hand from them, the natural response is they become animalistic in their behavior, and they are led around by their lusts rather than by their conscience, which has been suppressed to not even a whisper, but to a closed mouth.
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And what's the result? Well, sexual revolution is what Paul says.
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He says, after God gives a people up, what happens as a result? For their women exchanged natural relations.
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By the way, that word relations, just in case you're wondering, that is sexual relations.
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In the Greek, there is no doubt of what the term is being used here.
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In case somebody might try to call you out and say, oh, that doesn't mean sexual relations.
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Yes, it does.
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Very clearly.
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For women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature.
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And the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion for one another.
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Men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error.
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Now, I want to make this point, because recently this section of Romans 1 has come under a lot of scrutiny.
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In fact, there is a church in the Southern Baptist Convention.
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I don't believe it will be in the Southern Baptist Convention very long, because I believe they are going to remove the church.
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There is a church out on the other side of our land, which has decided to openly accept homosexuality within the church.
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And they have said that we've misunderstood this passage.
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This passage isn't talking about committed homosexual relationships.
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This passage is only talking about the negative, hurtful homosexual relationships.
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I'll read what I wrote here.
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This is what the argument typically says.
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Paul is not addressing committed same-sex couples, but rather he is addressing the sinful and rebellious acts of those, like Emperor Caligula, who was known for his extravagance and sexual perversity.
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Committed same-sex partnerships were not common in the ancient world and would not have been in Paul's purview.
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That's the basic argument.
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This isn't talking about same-sex relationships.
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This is talking about perverted same-sex relationships.
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This is not talking about committed relationships.
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Now, I want to offer three responses very briefly.
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I thought about doing a whole sermon on this, but I don't want to spend a whole sermon just on this.
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But I want to offer three responses.
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Number one, Paul addresses the lust of a man for another man as giving up that which is natural, and thus it is opposed to God's created order in any form.
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It is not natural.
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It is not the way man was created to express himself sexually.
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It is not biblical in any form.
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Number two, to say that the authors of Scripture were ignorant of such a thing as committed same-sex relationships is to essentially say that the Bible is not divinely inspired because you're saying the Holy Spirit was ignorant of this thing.
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Because that's what they say.
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Well, Paul just didn't know about committed same-sex relationships.
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He didn't know about that.
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Well, is the Holy Spirit ignorant? Because He is the ultimate author of this book.
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And number three and finally, the Bible is a heterosexual book from beginning to ending.
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It simply does not condemn homosexuality in a couple of passages, but rather it promotes the relationship between a husband and a wife from beginning to ending.
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A man and a woman are the only ones who can fulfill the command of Scripture to be fruitful and multiply.
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The Bible itself is committed to a husband and a wife relationship whereby a second generation from them can flow.
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It is not a book wherein you can pull out, well, this passage says homosexuality is wrong, and this passage says homosexuality is wrong, and create sort of a chain reference thing.
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Yeah, there are a couple of passages that really hit homosexuality hard, but the point is not that these passages hit homosexuality hard.
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The point is that the whole Bible promotes a certain type of sexuality, a sexuality between a husband and a wife in a committed marriage.
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It's a heterosexual book all the way through.
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Sexual perversion is an attempt of men to thwart the very reason for which they were created.
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Men were created to be fruitful and multiply.
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And instead, what do we do? We abort our babies.
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We don't want to multiply.
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I don't want the responsibility.
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What do we do? Well, we would be in a relationship with somebody I can't multiply with.
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So I'll be in a relationship with a mirror, someone just like me, because it's impossible for a mirror to produce.
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We've done everything we can to avoid the commandment to be fruitful and multiply.
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So, God has made Himself plain in nature.
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He's made Himself plain in our conscience.
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And instead of worshiping Him, what do we do? We turn from Him to idols.
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And what does He do? He gives us over to that idolatry.
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And what is the natural result? Sexual perversion.
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Radical sexual perversion.
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But it's not all.
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Because with it comes a litany of other sins.
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And that's what starts in verse 28.
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And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up.
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There's the third time.
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That same phrase, same construction, same thing is used.
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God gave them up, third time, to a debased mind.
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To do what ought not to be done.
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They're filled with all manner of unrighteousness.
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Evil, covetousness, malice.
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They're full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, maliciousness.
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Which is interesting, because when you are talking to somebody about this, if they say, well, you know, that homosexuality in Romans 1, that's not talking about homosexuality.
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Is murder talking about murder? Is strife talking about strife? And conceit talking about conceit? Paul's being fairly clear here.
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And he goes on to say they are gossips, slanders, haters of God.
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By the way, I would be remiss if I didn't say this.
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It's interesting that the phrase gossip and slander are right next to the phrase haters of God.
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You know, we often think of gossip as a little sin.
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Paul puts it right next to hatred of God, just so you know.
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Puts it right there in the same list.
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Insolent, haughty, boastful.
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And this one's interesting.
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Inventors of evil.
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They become so good at it that they create more of it.
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And different kinds.
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Disobedient to parents, children.
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The same list that has haters of God has disobedience to parents.
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Foolish, faithless, heartless.
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And this last one is so true.
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Ruthless.
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Have we ever lived in a more ruthless time? A video this week of a group of young people just went out to beat a lady up for no reason, then posted it all over the Internet.
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It happens all the time, but I just saw one out this week.
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Just took a stick and started beating this homeless person.
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No reason.
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This is a dark reality.
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This passage is.
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But who could argue that it doesn't resemble the decadence of our culture? Our culture celebrates depravity on television.
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Our culture rejoices in covetousness and advertising.
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Our culture hungers for gossip and slander in the media.
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And our culture exalts the prideful as virtuous.
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What's worse is not only do we do these evil things, but we give approval to those who do.
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And that's verse 32.
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And this is where we'll close.
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Though they know God's righteous decree that those who practice such things deserve to die.
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They not only do them.
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But they give approval to those who practice.
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That's Paul's way of saying what Isaiah already said.
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Woe to those who call evil good.
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Beloved, this is where we are as a nation.
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So let me close with these words.
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I hear people say all the time.
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If America don't change, God is going to judge us.
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Let me correct you.
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We're already under the judgment of God.
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We see the wrath of abandonment all around us.
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It's not coming.
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It's here.
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And the only thing that keeps our nation from being utterly and completely consumed is the precious elect of God who are within the walls of this nation.
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The very people that the culture hates are the people that are stemming the tides of judgment from rolling over this place and making it nothing but a parking lot.
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So what do we do? I didn't just bring you here to tell you how bad things are.
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That would be a bad way to end, wouldn't it? What can we do? What should God's people be doing in the midst of cultural depravity? Do we give up? Do we run to the monasteries? Do we go out into the wilderness and bury our heads in the sand? Or do we stand for truth in the midst of a cultural shift? Beloved, I hope the answer is obvious.
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I really do.
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We are not called to hide in monasteries.
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We are not called to hide behind walls of some type of commune.
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We are called to be salt and light.
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We are called to be ones who make changes.
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We are called to be ones who influence the culture for Christ.
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The church has a mandate to preach the truth, even when it is unpopular, even when it is dangerous, even when it is illegal.
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We have the mandate to preach the truth.
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The apostles said, we must serve God first.
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And they demonstrated it by even being willing to be put into chains for preaching the truth.
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I implore you to pray for our nation.
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I pray that you will pray and that we will all pray that men of God will preach the truth in this nation.
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That revival will spread.
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It has happened before and it can happen again.
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Pray that God will grant repentance from the top down.
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And when you say, God bless America, please don't ever stop there.
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But say, God bless America with repentance.
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For apart from repentance, we will stay in judgment.
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Father, thank you.
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Thank you for your word and your truth.
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I pray that you will use it first to convict us all to be praying for our nation.
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I pray for our president.
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I pray that he would repent of his sins and turn to Christ.
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I pray for everyone associated with the leadership, that they would turn to Christ and be saved.
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I pray for our pulpits in America.
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That the gospel of Jesus Christ and the truth of the word of God would be proclaimed.
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That we would quit bowing down to all of this political correct nonsense.
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But that we would stand for the truth.
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So that we would see revival.
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And not the fake, trumped up revivals.
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Where men shout about healings and knock people around and do foolish things in the name of a false God.
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But true revival.
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Where men bow the knee to Christ.
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And hearts are broken over sin.
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And false teachers are shut down.
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And the truth of God reigns.
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May it be, O God.
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May it be.
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In Jesus' name, Amen.
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Let's stand and sing.