Living a Holy Life Before The Holy God

Grace Covenant Reformed Church

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Make your way this morning to the book of Exodus we will find ourselves again in the 22nd chapter and while you turn

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I just want to kind of get us set up for the The conversation this morning so that we are prepared and understand

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What it is that God would have for us here today in? In first Peter chapter 1 and 13 through the 16th verse

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Peter writes therefore Having girded your minds for action being sober in spirit fix your hope completely on the grace to be brought to you at the revelation of Jesus Christ as obedient children not being conformed to the former lust which were yours in ignorance, but be

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Like the Holy One who called you Be holy yourselves also in all your conduct

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Because it is written you shall be holy for I am holy

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Similarly Paul in first Thessalonians chapter 4 verses 1 through 8 writing to the church at Thessalonica Says to them finally then brothers

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We ask and exhort you in the Lord Jesus that as you received from us as to how you ought to walk and please

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God Just as you actually do walk that you excel still more

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For you know what commandments we were who get we gave you through the Lord Jesus So this is the will of God your sanctification that you abstain from sexual immorality that each of you know how to possess his own vessel in sanctification and honor

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Not in lustful passion like the Gentiles who do not know God and that no man

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Transgresses and defraud his brother in the matter because the Lord is the Avenger in all things

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Just as we also told you before and solemnly warned you For God did not call us to impurity but in sanctification

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Consequently he who sets this aside is not setting aside man

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But the God who gives his Holy Spirit to you Now both of these passages one of the things that we are shown and one of the things that we are given a focus to is the fact that we as Believers are called to live a holy

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Life and that we do so in response to God's provision in our lives however

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We all too often find ourselves simply going along with the flow of the world versus living the life that God has commanded us

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To live in light of his word and accordance with the change that he brought about in the life of the new believer

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Remember we are his new creations Ephesians 2 10

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Just After we are shown that grace Through faith is what leads to salvation

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Paul writes to the church at Ephesus for we are his workmanship Created in Christ Jesus for good works, which

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God prepared beforehand so that we would walk in them Therefore remember that formerly you the

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Gentiles in the flesh who are called Uncircumcision by the so -called circumcision which is performed in the flesh by human hands remember that you were at that time without Christ Alienated from the citizenship of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise having no hope and without God in the world

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But now in Christ Jesus you who were formerly far off have been brought near By the blood of Christ for he himself is our peace who made both groups one and broke down the dividing wall of The partition by abolishing in his flesh the enmity the law of commandments contained in ordinances

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So that in himself he might create the two into one new man Making peace and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross having put himself to death

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Having in himself put to death the enmity And he came and preached the good news to you who were far away and peace to those who were near for through him

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We have both our access in one spirit to the Father So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens and with the

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Saints and are of God's household Having built on the foundation of the

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Apostles and the prophets Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone in whom the whole building being joined together is growing in a holy sanctuary in the

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Lord in whom you also are being built together into a dwelling of God in the

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Spirit that the Understanding is that as a result of our salvation as a result of us being those who were far away now being brought near The expectation is is that our lives are transformed and we move into a situation where we are

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No longer living in the ways that we used to live but we are now living in the ways that God has called us which ultimately means that we as Believers are called to live a holy life in front of the

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Holy God and so the question is How?

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Do we as the people of God new creations in Christ Jesus? How do we live a life a holy life in this present world?

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Over the last several weeks in our journey in Exodus, we have been focusing on the law of God And when

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God had first introduced this law in Exodus He did so with these words in Exodus 20 verses 1 & 2

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Then God spoke all these words saying I am Yahweh Who brought you out of the land of Egypt out of the house of slavery reminding us of a few amazing truths first and foremost that this is the word of the

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Living God that this is not the Word of man that these are the truths spoken to us by God that he alone is our

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God and that he alone without any Assistance or help or any desire on our part

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Delivered us according to his power and his own pleasure ultimately for his own glory

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However in our lives To be specific the lives of most believers

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Law of God holds relatively little value We run through the the texts and what we would call the

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Pentateuch the book of the law the first five books of the Old Testament We enjoy the stories that we find but when we encounter the law the rules the the regulations the the expectations that God places on our life

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We really struggle We struggle to find relevance to our modern way of living

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We find struggle to find relevance on how we apply these things to our life

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Yet we must because this is the word of the Living God.

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This is sacred scripture. It is our Responsibility to rightly apply this profitable word in our lives daily and To do so we've got to study this word

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Now when we come to our text for today again in Exodus chapter 22

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It's gonna seem as there is kind of a random selection of one -line

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Situations that we have going on in the law But as we begin to Study and dig deeper into these verses we find that there is

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More Than just a list of actions to be taken or to be avoided that in fact these laws

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Rightly understood in light of the rest of Scripture show us that as believers We are called to live a holy life before the

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Holy God And so let us take a look this morning at our text

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Would you stand if you can in honor of the reading of the Word of the Living God? If a man who seduces a virgin who is not engaged and lies with her he must pay a dowry

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For her to be his wife If her father absolutely refuses to give her to him he shall pay money equal to the dowry for virgins

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You shall not allow a sorceress to live whoever lies with Shall surely be put to death and he who sacrifices to any

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God other than to Yahweh alone Shall be devoted to destruction

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You shall not mistreat a sojourner or oppress him for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt You shall not afflict any widow or orphan and if in you indeed afflict him and he earnestly cries out to me

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I will surely hear his cry and my anger will burn and I will kill you with the sword and your wives shall become widows and your children fatherless

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If you lend money to my people To the afflicted among you you are not to act as a creditor to him.

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You shall not charge him interest If you ever take your neighbor's cloak as a pledge

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You shall return it to him before the Sun sets for that is his only covering

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It is his cloak for his body. What else shall he sleep in? And it shall be that when he cries out to me,

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I will hear him for I am gracious You shall not curse

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God nor curse a ruler of your people You shall not delay the offering from the fullness of your harvest and the juice of your wine vat

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The firstborn of your sons you shall give to me You shall do the same with your oxen and with your sheep

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It shall be with his mother seven days and on the eighth day. You shall give it to me You shall be holy men to me

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Therefore you shall not eat any flesh torn to pieces in the field You shall throw it to the dogs father we thank you for your word

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We pray this morning that as we come to the study of your word that your spirit would commend this word to our hearts and lives

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That we would seek to live according to your truth and live in a manner that makes our life a sweet aroma in your sight

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We pray this in the name of your precious son Jesus Christ I'm in you may be seated. I know this will probably come as a

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Difficult truth to most of you sitting here this morning, but we live in a shocking time

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I Know I know at least That would seem to be the case

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We turn on the TV and we see news and we see situations and our mouths can fall open in awe

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But the truth is The truth of the matter is that there is nothing shocking about the time in which we live to God From all eternity past God shapes and molds the way in which we as believers live our lives and approach this world

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Our right understanding of him Helps to direct this

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But it's imperative of us that we get to this right understanding So often we are quick as Believers as people to point out all of the things that we see that the world is doing wrong

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In the eyes of God and the question that we often ask or should be asking is if the world is living in this way

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How am I living? Are we taking stock of our own lives?

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To be sure that we are wholly living a holy life

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W -h -o -l -l -y h -o -l -y holy living a holy life

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Doesn't take long for us to look around and know and understand that this world is lost

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It's broken and it is doomed for destruction But thanks be to God that we are not of this world in our understanding

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We should recognize that Although this world is doomed for destruction.

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We have a hope and a future but the church today faces an

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Epidemic and it is not a new epidemic. In fact, it is an epidemic that is

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Increasingly progressing and unfortunately this epidemic actually deals and Is founded on the issue of sexual impurity

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What we see in the church today is it coming to us in many forms the church looks just like the world

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There is adultery. There is promiscuity. There is homosexuality There is in this specific chapter what is mentioned here is

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Fornication or pre -marital sex And so we look here in in chapter 22 verses 16 and 17 and Initially when we look at this text the way most of us in our modern day

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Reading will react to this is that there is an issue going on here that has to do with something called rape

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This is a forced act But the language here actually shows us that this is not a forced act that in fact that this is a consensual action

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Now the first thing that we need to understand is that the world today Has approached sex with the attitude that is nothing more than an experience to be enjoyed for the pleasure that it brings

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And unfortunately this attitude and approach has invaded the church The church has become afraid to stand up and to stand firm on God's Word and to hold our people accountable to its commands so when we get to this text

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And we begin to do a proper study in a proper evaluation of exactly What it is

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God is trying to get to in this passage the first thing we have to obviously deal with is exactly what type of Interaction this is and this is where it becomes important that we understand that this is not rape now

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How do we know it's not rape well the first thing we know and the first reason we know the first clue We have found right in the verses themselves because it says that if this happens

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Then he must pay a dowry for her to be his wife well in Deuteronomy chapter 22 verses 25 through 27

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The word says but if in the field the man finds the girl who was engaged and the man forces her and Lies with her then only the man who lies with her shall die

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But you shall do nothing to the girl there is no sin in the girl worthy of death for just as a man rises against His neighbor and murders him so is this case when he found her in the field the engaged girl cried out

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But there was no one to save her so we see in the Word of God that the action of rape in The civil law of the time was punishable by death.

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Well. That's not what we see in Exodus 22 What we see in Exodus 22 and and what is further confirmed by an understanding of the word that we have here the

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English word that Is translated the Hebrew word is that is translated as the English word

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Seduces is that it actually means to persuade or entice

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In fact most places that we find it in the Word of God in the Old Testament it is translated

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Enticement so it is a consensual encounter between a man and a woman so What does that mean?

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Well what it means is that this action is occurring prior to marriage?

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so we see and We understand and we know from the study of God's Word that sex is a gift of God that is to be enjoyed only

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Within the confines of marriage and that marriage is clearly defined by God as a union between one man and one woman

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Whether to join together to become one flesh and so anything other than that becomes a sin

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Now a Couple of words of caution First of all when we look at this text it can become easy to justify the situation

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We can excuse it with thoughts of well We were going to get married anyway, or we are married in the eyes of God so we can just continue in our relationship

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But what we find in the text is something completely different than that We find a requirement

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That is placed in the situation now the other part that comes in here that that is often misunderstood by the world is this this

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What appears to be a buying and selling of a daughter in the situation of marriage?

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but all what we see is that this is a Infraction that occurs with the penalty and the bride price the dowry that's paid here

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We don't have a specific direction in which it is paid in fact in Genesis 24 53

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We read the servant brought out articles of silver and articles of gold and garments and gave them to Rebecca He also gave precious things to her brother and to her mother and in this situation that sort of a dent

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Indicates that the bride price is actually paid to the bride which gives an indication of the support that the husband would be able to take care of his wife as Time went on But if you'll note however in the second verse it shows us that the father has this

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Responsibility that goes along with his He has the responsibility of protecting his daughter and the responsibility here is that he can actually reject the marriage

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But even if he rejects the marriage the man is still responsible to pay the bride price

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Now Two things that we can pull from these verses

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First of all and this would be a general statement that is true of most of Scripture men

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Or all of Scripture, but men have been given the responsibility and have been entrusted with the care and protection of women now

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This is a Unpopular and controversial belief and It has become unpopular and controversial in recent years

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Because it is seen as an oppression and the reality is it is a freeing

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It is actually a provision of God that allows the woman to flourish

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Under the care and protection of a truly godly man That has a godly man that we would first seek to protect the purity of the woman there's a

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Responsibility here of the man in the initial paragraph in the initial clause that he is the one who does the enticing

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He is the one who does the wooing He is the one who does the persuading and as a result of that he now has a responsibility to take care of this woman

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Not just for a moment but for a lifetime now we would be tempted to say that Woman doesn't need a man, but that would be to go against The very created order that God has given us in his

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Word and as a side note just because we no longer pay a bride price a dowry

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It still is right in the eyes of God to seek the blessing of the Father when a Christian young man

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Seeks to marry a Christian young woman But none of that Is the true

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Depth of what we see here You see the true nature of what

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God is getting to is That God is a holy God In fact in Scripture There is only one attribute of God that is elevated to the third level and that is that he is holy

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The book of Isaiah as Isaiah encounters God or Encounters the vision of Christ on the throne and the seraphim are singing back and forth and in antiphonal response they are crying holy holy holy and God's holiness is the only one of his attributes that get to this level and that every man of God in Scripture who is confronted with the holiness of God has a visceral reaction to this

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And we are to strive to live our lives in such a holy manner

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And one of the ways in which we do this is by respecting and honoring

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What God has given us when it comes to our sexuality? But it is

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Specifically given to us in a specific place in a specific time frame

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For a specific purpose and that as we defame that or as we dishonor that we dishonor

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God and so we Know that purity in our sexual life is of extreme importance in order to live a holy life before the

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Holy God, however what we also must have is

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Purity in worship Now the next three verses deal with three situations or three circumstances that while At first blush kind of seen not necessarily this

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Disconnected from each other but just odd in their placement. They actually show us an issue with purity in Worship it says three things you shall not allow a sorceress to live

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Whoever lies with an animal shall surely be put to death and whoever sacrifices to any God other than Yahweh alone shall be devoted to destruction now

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The interesting thing about worship is worship. It has become one of those things in the life of the church that has decree degraded from what

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God originally intended and we have no true reverence and Understanding of exactly what we are doing because we forget that every time

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We see impure worship in the Word of God. It is a recipe for disaster. I want to give you two examples just two

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First of all when Leviticus chapter 10 verses 1 and 2 we see Nahab and Abihu write the sons of Aaron Who took their respective fire pans and put fire in them?

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They placed incense on it and then offered what scripture describes as strange fire before God Before Yahweh, which he had not commanded them

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Now the interesting thing about this is if you read through all of this text, there is a very specific

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Mixture that they are supposed to use when offering this offering I mean God details it out to the letter

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And so what we know is that these two young men decided well, I want to maybe you didn't like the smell of it

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Right, maybe they weren't trying to be funny at all. Maybe they weren't trying to to offend

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God They were simply trying to adjust it for their own personal pleasure or whatever

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But what we see is a response from God because we have strange fire offered before him and it says in verse 2 and fire came out from the presence of Yahweh and Consumed them and they died

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Before Yahweh and yet we we in our culture today say, okay

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Well, we can kind of do whatever we want to do when it comes to worship But then there's the second one

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And the second one's a little bit difficult a little bit difficult for many people to grasp But it comes to us in a couple of places.

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I'm going to use the account in 2nd Samuel chapter 6 In 2nd

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Samuel chapter 6 verses 3 through 8 we find that and they drove the Ark of God on a new cart that they might bring it from the house of Abinadab which was on the hill and Uzzah and Aho the sons of Abinadab were leading the cart

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So now just to kind of refresh your memory that the Ark of the Covenant Had been taken captive and it is being now brought back to the people of God And so they put it on a brand new cart and they begin to bring it to this place and so it says they brought with the

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Ark of God out from the house of Abinadab which was on the hill and One was walking ahead of the

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Ark. Aho was walking ahead of the Ark Now David and all the house of Israel were celebrating before Yahweh With all kinds of instruments made of fir wood and with lyres harps tambourines

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Castanets and cymbals Then they came to the threshing floor of Nacon and Uzzah Reached out toward the

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Ark and took hold of it because the oxen nearly Upset it now before we go any further first thing

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We've got to be reminded of is that there are specific rules around the handling of the

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Ark of the Covenant God delivers a very Detailed account of how this particular piece of Furniture for the tabernacle was supposed to be carried cared for and taken care of Now in Uzzah's mind all he's trying to do is prevent the

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Ark from hitting the ground Right, it seems okay, but remember

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God gives specific directions and so it says in the anger of Yahweh burned against Uzzah and God struck him down for his irreverence and he died there by the

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Ark of God Now David became angry

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And he became angry at God and it's easy for us to become angry at God But the reality is it was

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Uzzah that sinned There was a direct disobedience in both of these situations when it came to their right

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Handling of the implements or the worship that was given to them by God and how they should come before God in our text today we have three examples of impure worship and if you'll note

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Each one of them carries with it the penalty of death

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Not maybe not possibly not could be not. Well, you know if it was by accident, it's okay

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Notice that each one of these says first verse 18 You shall not allow a sorceress to live verse 19

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Whoever lies with an animal shall surely be put to death verse 20 Anyone who sacrifices to any

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God other than to Yahweh alone shall be devoted to destruction now

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We want to take a little bit deeper look at these three examples because unfortunately for us

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We take these three at face value and don't truly understand that these three things

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Still impact our life today Most people can get on board with idolatry

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But that's the only one of the three But he begins here with a sorceress now we talked sorcery and witchcraft up to an area of fantasy and fiction

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However This is a very real situation in 2014 10 years ago

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It was a study done that estimated Approximately 1 .5

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million self -proclaimed Wiccans in the US According to an article published in 2011

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Wicca was the fastest growing religion in the United States Now Some would be very quick to say well, what's the big deal?

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They're good witches. They're bad witches. How do we know they're good witches and bad witches? well, we've all seen the Wizard of Oz right and there was the good witch from the north and the bad witch or the wicked witch from the

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West and if you'll remember this this Example came to us.

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It was written by Frank L Baum in 1900 It was made into a movie in 1939 that has become world famous and it is celebrated over and over but the reality is that this this

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Harmless fun is truly Seeking to gain power through the use of demonic forces now

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If you have an interaction with the Wiccan And you say to them you're using demonic forces.

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They're going to tell you they're not What they're going to tell you is that that they are commuting with nature

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But listen, the problem is the same

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The problem is is that they are trying to persuade or move

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God based on these actions of their own The problem is is that they have traded as Paul writes in his letter to the

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Romans the truth of the Creator for the lion I worship the created instead of the Creator exchanging the glory of the incorruptible

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God for an image and the likeness of corruptible man and of birds and of four -footed animals and crawling

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Creatures and the result is a work And is not pleasing to God because it is not pure and true and right

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And here's what may shock you even more than that is this has become part of mainstream

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Society it is in books. It is in movies.

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We see it repeatedly And yet at Christians we

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Chalk it up to good fun, and we don't recognize the impact

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That it's having on individuals the next thing we come to in this

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Issue these three issues we face around worship is this perversion of bestiality now some would say that this actually belongs to the previous first two verses because of the

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Sexuality part of the nature, but the reality is that there is a sexual component, but this is not specifically dealing with sexuality in fact it is a

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Flagrant disregard of the structure and order that God has endowed on creation according to John McKay The true impetus behind this is an effort of people to unite with their

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God through the animal That represented them in the land of Canaan the promised land to where the

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Israelites were headed Baal was often depicted as having sex with a cow so the movement was to commune with God Their God so again

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It is impure Improper Incorrect not real idol worship

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Then we have the third which is specifically brought up here by Moses as being idolatry

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Now the Decalogue the Ten Commandments make it very clear abundantly clear that the worship of idols was forbidden in and in that we see in verses 4 and 5 of chapter 20 of Exodus You shall not make for yourself an idol or any likeness of what is in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the water

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Under the earth you shall not worship them or serve them for I Yahweh your God am a jealous

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God Visiting the iniquity of the fathers of the children on the third and the fourth generation of those who hate me again, we see the seriousness of this sin in the result or in the

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Actions that must be taken on one who commits the sin look look at this First of all, we're we're commanded to not allow a sorceress to live.

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So they the sorceress is to be put to death Secondly, we are told that whoever lies with an animal shall be put to death but in the third one the versage in the verbiage is a little bit different notice that it says here that for Anyone who serve sacrifices to any

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God other than to Yahweh alone shall be devoted to Destruction now, I want you to understand that this goes beyond a simple matter of an execution to be devoted to this to Destruction actually meant in the

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Hebrew word that was utter and complete and didn't just involve the individual But also all of the individuals property

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Everything the individual owned all that the individual was was to be destroyed and redeemed

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For God remember God is a jealous God and will not

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Share his glory So we may see these things as requiring this punishment by death as Severe and they are because they're dealing with our holiness in front of God Now what we have to keep in mind is that this doesn't give us the right to go out and take the life

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Remember these laws were given to Jews and that were to be upheld and punished by civil authorities however

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That doesn't mean that there is no application in our life today That doesn't mean that there isn't a punishment in our life today

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We see that the death here is that is the same as the punishment for these sins the death that in Adam We all died all of us

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Died we were Sinners and we have a sinful nature in our church

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We apply these laws by ensuring that we are operating under the regulative

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Principle of worship to make sure that our worship is not only worthy in the eyes of God But that is also pure and holy so that it will be will give all the focus and glory to God Not to the man standing

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But to the God who is over all things But when it is not true of our worship and when the scandalous sin of idolatry breaks into our ranks there is a responsibility

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Placed on the church Interestingly enough if you were to go out and to speak with the broad spectrum of what could be called

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Evangelical Christianity today most of them would explicitly tell you that what I'm about to say is foolishness

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But God demands of his church for us to exercise

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Justice within the church we are commanded to exercise

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Discipline and practice discipline within the church We are commanded to call each other to greater holy living and to call each other out when we're not living holy lives even to the point of separating

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From a member for the sake of the body We could launch it to a whole nother sermon here right on Jesus's passage talking about it

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But if an eye offends plug it out throw it away For fear that it affects the entire body

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This is specifically dealing with the life of the church and and the individuals within the church in the way

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We are supposed to live together We're called to to unity and worship and holiness, but we are to do it together corporately and we are to hold one another

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Accountable and so we see first of all that Purity in our sexuality is imperative for living a holy life before the

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Holy God Purity in our worship is also Required to live a holy life before the

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Holy God, but then we also According to the next set of verses must demonstrate

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Compassion So as we look at verses 21 27 God gives us these pictures of Dealing with foreigners in the land of widows and orphans and of those who are less fortunate now to begin with he starts by reminding the people of how they should treat strangers in a strange land and He specifically says here for them to not

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Mistreat a sojourner or oppress him and this language here is the exact language

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That's used to refer to how they were treated in the land of Egypt So they would have a very good understanding of what

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God was commanding them not to do Leviticus 1934 it says the sojourner who sojourns with you shall be to you as the native among you and you shall love him as yourself

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If for you were sojourners in the land of Egypt, I am Yahweh your

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God as Believers we are to have compassion on those who are strangers in a strange land now

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We must be very careful with this and and we've seen this movement in church today that we would call the woke or Social justice gospel where we take this to an extreme

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That's not what God is commanding here God's not commanding this this Unequal in fact what

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God shows over and over in his words specifically as we deal with the law is the equality that is to be delivered to all

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But you need to think of it in this way Jesus described the second of the two great commandments love thy neighbor as thyself

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One of the commands that God gives us in his word is to take the gospel to the ends of the earth

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One of the things that we have the responsibility of or that we see is that the ends of the earth have now come to Us, but how can we be obedient to that command?

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How can we be obedient to what God has said when we have contempt and dislike for others?

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Right history makes it easy to to to have this and to excuse this way because of the way we have been treated

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But God makes it clear in his word that we are not to treat others the way we have been treated But the way

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God has lived his life and died for us In fact

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Jesus goes on listen Ain't just enough to love your enemy now if you think about those words for just a minute

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They're very difficult to deal with Because the last thing we want to do is love our enemy, but what a better way to show love

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Than to proclaim the gospel even to our enemy This is not about turning a blind eye this is not about accepting things that are wrong.

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This is about the gospel of Christ Then we have a passage that deals with widows and orphans in fact.

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He spends a lot of time Talking about widows and orphans you shall not afflict any widow or orphan

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And and if you indeed afflict him, and if he earnestly cries out to me I will surely hear his cry my anger will burn against you

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I will kill you with the sword and your wives will then become widows and your children fatherless So your wives and your children will become widows and orphans the term orphan here literally means

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Literally refers to children without a father and part of the problem in that day in time and in that culture was that women

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Who were widows lost all rights to things? So the the male of the household was the one in whom things

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Went down and so as the woman was moved out if you go and you studied the book of Ruth This gives you a beautiful picture of what we see happening in Ruth What happens in the life of Ruth and Naomi their husband their children all die and so they are left?

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Widowless and poor and destitute until they find their Redeemer in Boaz But you know

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God himself becomes a husband to the widow and a father to the fatherless through Christ's finished work on Calvary's cross

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The church becoming his bride and us being adopted into the family of God then we have this third group and that are those that are less fortunate now, there's a little bit of Difficulty here

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Simply because the the manner in which things are occurring don't happen this way anymore

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Nobody's going to give you a loan based on your cloak You're not going to go to the bank take your nicest jacket and say hey,

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I'm I'm giving you this nicest jacket for collateral You're not going to take your blankets and your bedspread and and take it to the bank and give it to them for collateral

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But the the understanding is not between you and secular world This would be between those of the the faith these are between believers and so the restriction would be against charging interest and and Demonstrating compare and a care and compassion to ensure that our brothers and sisters are taken care of In the church the implication would be that if a fellow believer has need that we should lend interest free but then

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Christ Goes a step further and says not only should we do so we should lend it to our fellow believer

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In a manner that we did not even expect Repayment now what

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I I need to ensure that we all understand here is this is not really about borrowing and lending

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Philip Rikin wrote it this way We were strangers in the world

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Alienated from God by our rebellion. We were widows and orphans outside the family of God We were debtors impoverished by the stinginess of our own sinful hearts

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But God loved us in Jesus Christ Jesus became a man a real human being to end our estrangement everyone who believes in Jesus is welcomed into God's family

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We are no longer widows The Bible describes the church as a beautiful bride of Christ We are no longer orphans because through faith in Christ.

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We have been adopted as sons and daughters of God the Father God has even paid the debt that we owe by sending his son to the cross for our sins

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Jesus instructing his disciples Tells them forgive us our trespasses as to pray in the manner that says forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those

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Who trespass against us? That's the old King James Version that we all grew up and know and Memorized as we were playing sports because that's where you really heard the

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Lord's Prayer most often It really wasn't in the church. You really heard it playing sports because you had to pray that before every ballgame. So maybe you would win

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But the reality is is it's so far from that that can't even be the truth

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The reality is is this is about debt a debt that we owe a debt that we cannot pay

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That he paid and that in response to that this is how we treat others

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God calls on us to have Compassion on those who are less fortunate those who are still strangers still widows still orphans who have not been adopted as sons and daughters

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And how do we show compassion for them? We give them the gospel

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We show them love and mercy we demonstrate Not because of what they've done

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Not because of how they deserve Listen if you waited and or if God waited till we deserved or had done something to earn salvation none of us would have ever heard the gospel if we wait till somebody looks clean enough or or looks right enough or they're

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Straight enough or they're this enough or they're that enough to deliver the gospel. Then we've also failed on the part of the gospel but the other side of that is if we don't give them the whole gospel the whole counsel of God if we don't take them under our wings and disciple them then we really just do what

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Jesus accused the Pharisees of doing and traveling all the way around the world to creating a

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Proselyte and make them twice the son of the devil Because we don't give them the whole counsel of God.

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So we've seen In order for us to live a holy life before the Holy God we must be pure in our sexuality and in our worship

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We must have compassion on those who are less fortunate, but the text gives us one more truth about coming to a holy living and and that is that the holiness in our life must be pervasive in other words, it has to get to every single bit an aspect of our life

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It's very easy to fall into the trap of simply Following the rules checking the boxes doing things that God has called us to do being obedient to the better letter of the law

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Living in the life that the Pharisees did but when we understand

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God's expectations regarding our response to his word this changes and These last few verses

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Although they seem odd Give us a very clear picture of The indicate a clear picture of the response that he expects.

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Look at the very first words Right we get to verse 20 Not 29,

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I think

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I skipped something well verse 28 you

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Shall not curse God nor curse a ruler of Your people so the first command here the first response here that we are to have is to honor

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The authorities that God has placed in our life Now this is closely related to the fifth commandment the the the fifth commandment being that of honoring your father and your mother

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So if you remember as we went through the Ten Commandments this description or this This understanding that we had as we approach the

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Ten Commandments dealt with that This was the worst of a kind of sin So the dishonoring of your father and mother was the worst of a kind of sin but dishonoring the authorities that God has placed in our life is

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Closely related to that and again, this doesn't come because of anything that they have done to deserve it

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It comes because of our respect For God that we honor him and those people that he has placed into those positions according to his

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Sovereign will now all of us know that this be very difficult And it can be difficult because these people that are in these places are humans that are lost.

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They are fallen They are broken. They are in need of a Savior But they are humans and so it's it's the

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Authority that has been given to them by God not because of anything that they have done and this this points to not just the authority

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In the home not just in the authority in the church But the most difficult one of us to deal for us to deal with is even in the secular world again

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Honoring this authority is because of God not the individual Consider these words from Acts chapter 23

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Then Paul said to him God is going to strike you you whitewashed wall Do you sit to try me according to the law and in violation of the law order me to be struck

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But those standing nearby said do you revile the high priest of God and Paul said

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I Was not aware brothers that he was the high priest For it is written.

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You shall not speak evil of a ruler of your people Now what's interesting here is Paul's reaction

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Paul's anger Was in response to the high priest command that he be struck

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In fact in verse 2 it says that the high priest is command for Paul to be struck on the mouth and so this was a sign of disrespect and So most of us would have to say that that Paul's anger here was righteous that it was okay because of The actions of the high priest but notice

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Paul's response That it was different and contrary to that look at look at what he said

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He said I and I was not aware brothers That he was the high priest for it is written you shall not disrespect or you shall not speak evil of a ruler of your people

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And so Paul's response would be the same as our response or should be the same as our response our honoring

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Our honoring the people in the positions has nothing to do with the people and all to do with honoring

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God And the truth that his it is his sovereign will

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That this individual is in that position the next thing that we see when it comes to the way that we are to Live this life in front of God is that we are to give the very best of Ourself now of course scripture talks about giving the the first fruits of the fullness of your heart harvest and the juice of your wine that But then it goes on to even talk about the sons and the oxen and the sheep and all of these things would be dedicated to God so we show that Obviously in our life.

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We we give the first fruits of God in our offerings and our tithes But but it is more about understanding the place of things and the place of God in our lives

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Listen God is a giver of all things we all Believe that he owns all things.

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Hopefully we all believe that he created all things. Hopefully we all believe that he by his Hand all things are held together

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So the return of what he gave is simply to keep him at the right place in our life pastor and theologian

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Votibakam it rightly explains it like this. God is not against you having things. He is against things having you and the truth is

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That as we understand the right place of the provisions of God as compared to God himself It's not that the possessions of life that are a gift of God and and that we need to ensure that we keep their proper

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Relation to God, but that all we have everything not just possessions Everything we have and and keeping it in a right

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Relationship to God it's very easy for our family and our loved ones and our friends and in all manner of things to to creep into a place that is

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Exalted higher than they should be and to really literally place them above God but the truth of what

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God would have us to do is get God comes first and and all things are

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Submitted unto him and so it's important that in all manner we acknowledge

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God But then we come to this very small very short very interesting last verse

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Now note the first part of this verse and and Quite honestly this verse may not make a whole lot of sense to you, but hopefully we can help enlighten you

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Note the first part It begins with a very simple command that in fact the command that we have literally been working with all morning long

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Look at the command in the very first Clause of 31 you shall be holy men to me

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Simple that we are commanded to live a holy life before God But then the verse goes on to say therefore now what's interesting here is

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That word therefore is a conjuncting word meaning that what's to follow Is impacted by what is to begin and so it says therefore you shall not eat any flesh

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Torn to pieces in the field you shall throw it to the dogs now to put this in modern -day

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Vernacular let's talk about roadkill So this is an animal that has been destroyed in some manner

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The manner is that it has been torn apart, but we are not sure by what?

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In Leviticus chapter 11 God gives great detail to his people Regarding the animals that are clean and unclean that they are forbidden to partake of the unclean animals so that they will not be defiled

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And we sit here we go. Oh, what does this got to do with us? You know Peter had division in acts that that now all things are are good and clean and we can eat them

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So why does that? Have to do with my roadkill well. It doesn't have anything to do with your roadkill in reality

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It had to do with their roadkill because it could have been torn apart by an animal that was unclean

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And so it would ultimately defile them what this has really got to do with is the little things in your life those small and Insignificant things that you think aren't really a big deal

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Listen if you were a person in this day and time and you came along Meat that had been killed in the field and you saw it and you could tell it was fresh

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There's nothing to prevent you from picking it up and going and cooking it except for the fact

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That whatever did the killing Could have been unclean Which would have then made the meat unclean now again you seeing a nice juicy possum beside the road and Stopping and scooping that bad boy up to make you some good possum stew has got nothing to do with this passage

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What it has got to do with though is those little teeny things in our life those those Minuscule things that we don't even think about that that we excuse right because they're not that big of a deal

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They come before a holy God That affect our

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Willingness and our holiness and our holy life in front of him

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If we go back and we examine right the passages that we've just worked through We can get examples of this from each one of these passages

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Right, but the husband and or the the man and the young lady that get a little too far gone in their

01:00:25

Relationship Right well, it's it's okay because we're gonna be married one day God's not gonna be too upset with us

01:00:33

Or maybe it's the well. You know the lady down the street is you know she's lost and and in this situation and What's okay, or maybe it's the church that Worships in a manner that is absolutely against what

01:00:50

God has called and yet we stand by and we say nothing Why because we would rather get along or maybe?

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Maybe we were very adept at not having compassion on others

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And we excuse it And we don't and we don't say that it's important, and we take these things and we make excuses

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And we continue to go along Instead of dealing with them Now each of you sitting here this morning

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Remember a few months ago where We dealt with an issue that had been an issue that had been just going along in the place that we were

01:01:50

And while it may not have seemed to be that big of a deal at that time it has now brought us to where we Are today in a situation where we are free to worship and love and give honor to God in the way that we see as being according to the

01:02:03

Word of God but yet It is all too often easier to just simply ignore the things that we think are

01:02:16

Insignificant to live a holy life

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Before the Holy God we have to submit to his word

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We have to recognize What he has called us to do we have to live a pure life and in our sexuality in our worship

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We have to have compassion on others We have to put everything to God So my question this morning to wrap us up closes out is are you willing to do what is called for in his word?

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to live that holy life in front of the Holy God Most gracious Heavenly Father.

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We thank you We thank you for the opportunity to worship to To gather to study a word

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Father we thank you for the truth that we find there. Well, we know that oftentimes in today's world and today's society that It can become easy

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To ignore the small things

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To fail to recognize the major impact

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That they are having father. We pray that we would just desire with the greatest desire to be obedient to your word

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That we would submit our lives to you that we would wholly and fully and completely

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Place ourselves in your hands Father we thank you for this time of worship together

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We ask again that your spirit commend your word to our hearts and lives Father we ask all of this in the name of your precious son