Sunday Morning, December 6, 2020 AM

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Michael Dirrim Pastor of Sunnyside Baptist Church OKC "Praise the Lord, Our Help and Shield!" (part 2) Psalm 115:1-18

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All right, good morning, everyone.
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Good morning. I want to welcome you to Sunnyside Baptist Church this morning. We're glad that you can join us for worship and to just gather together and love on each other.
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A few announcements as we get started this morning. Come back this evening at 5 .30 for our evening service,
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Christmas Choir, just a reminder. There's a rehearsal again tonight. Wednesday at 6 .30,
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we'll have Bible study and prayer meeting. Again, TAG is on break until after the new year begins.
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And then looking ahead, Sunday, December 20th, we'll have communion in our morning service that morning.
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And then in the evening at 5 .30, we'll have our traditional carols and candlelight service as well.
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Our fighter verse for this week comes from 1 Corinthians chapter 15, verses 51 and 52.
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Behold, I tell you a mystery. We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed in a moment in the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound and the dead will be raised imperishable and we shall be changed.
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You'll notice if you have your bulletin, one of the songs that we're going to be singing is actually in the bulletin.
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So if you didn't get a bulletin on your way in, you might look out for that. Those words will also be on the screen.
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Just a reminder as kind of the increase of COVID cases are going on, we want to try not to linger indoors as much as we can.
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So once service is dismissed, go ahead and fellowship out on the porch outside. And then
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I saw a ton of people already taking advantage of the Christmas mailbox. So if you have your Christmas cards, you can save your postage and put those there at the back as well.
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All right. Any other announcements before we get started this morning? All right.
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Well, we're going to have a time of prayer and preparation, and then after, Dad will open us in prayer.
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Lord God Almighty, we bow before you this morning to give you glory, honor, and blessing in Jesus' name.
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Help us this morning to fulfill the call of the psalmist who said,
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Oh, come, let us worship and bow down. Let us kneel before the
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Lord, our maker, for he is our God, and we are the people of his pasture and the sheep of his hand.
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Thank you for caring for us, for gently leading us, for providing daily for us, not just in the physical needs that we have for food and clothing and shelter, but you have given us the
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Son, Jesus Christ, our Savior. Lord, in this season, we are especially mindful of the great gift that was given because of love, the gift of Christ, our
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Savior. So may we worship and bow down, Lord, at your feet, for you are worthy to receive all glory and honor and praise.
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Help us to draw near with glad and sincere hearts and in full assurance of faith to the praise of the glorious name of Jesus Christ, our
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Lord. Amen. Well, good morning.
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Today is the second Sunday of Advent, and we have reached
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December of 2020. And you know that Jesus is enough.
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Jesus is enough. Jesus is enough. We need nothing else.
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Would you stand as we begin our service with our call of worship, call to worship.
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This is from Psalm 56, 1 through 3. If you would read it with me, please. Be gracious to me,
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O God, for man tramples on me all day long, and attacker oppresses me all day long.
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For many attack me proudly when I am afraid I put my trust in you.
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Our songs are all out of your Blue Hymn, though, but we're going to start with 120, The Advent of Our God, and then 121,
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The Word Made Flesh, and then the song that's in your bulletin,
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No Other Name. The Advent of our
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God, with eager hearts we greet, and we must praise him in this night with hymns and anthems sweet.
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All glory to the Son, who comes to set us free, with Father, Spirit, and the
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One through all eternity. The Word, thus full of grace and full of truth, the only
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Son of God, we have beheld his glory, and we have seen his might.
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Anointed Prince of Glory, we marvel at thy sight.
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The Word made flesh he received, grace on grace and lasting mercy, truth and faith we have seen the might.
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Anointed Prince of Glory, we marvel at thy sight.
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No other name but the name of Jesus.
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No other name but the name of the Lord. No other name but the name of Jesus.
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He's worthy of glory, and worthy of honor, and worthy of power and of praise.
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His name is exalted far above the earth, his name is high above the heavens.
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His name is exalted, he's ours.
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No other name but the name of the Lord. Jesus is worthy of glory, and worthy of honor, and worthy of power.
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We'll be reading this morning from Deuteronomy 28. This may be the first time
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I've stopped in the middle of a chapter, so you may have to stop me. Just throw something at me. Starting in verse 20,
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I'm going to read through 44. The Lord will send upon you curses, confusion and rebuke, and all you undertake to do, until you are destroyed and until you perish quickly on account of the evil of your deeds, because you have forsaken me.
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The Lord will make the pestilence cling to you until he has consumed you from the land where you are entering to possess it.
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The Lord will smite you with consumption, and with fever, and with inflammation, and with the fire of heat, and with the sword, and with the blight, and with mildew, and they will pursue you until you perish.
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The heaven which is over your head shall be bronze, and the earth which is under you iron. The Lord will make the rain of your land powder and dust.
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From heaven it shall come down on you until you are destroyed. The Lord will cause you to be defeated before your enemies.
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You will go out one way against them, but you will flee seven ways before them, and you will be an example of terror to all the kingdoms of the earth.
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Your carcasses will be food to all the birds of the sky and to the beasts of the earth, and there will be no one to frighten them away.
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The Lord will smite you with boils of Egypt, and with tremors, and with a scab, and with the itch from which you cannot be healed.
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The Lord will smite you with madness, and with blindness, and with bewilderment of heart, and you will grope at noon as a blind man gropes in darkness, and you will not prosper in your ways, but you shall only be oppressed and robbed continually, with none to save you.
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You shall betroth a woman, but another man will violate her. You shall build a house, but you will not live in it.
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You shall plant a vineyard, but you will not eat its fruit. Your ox shall be slaughtered before your eyes, but you will not eat of it.
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Your donkey shall be torn away from you and will not be restored to you. Your sheep shall be given to your enemies, and you will have none to save you.
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Your sons and your daughters shall be given to other people while your eyes look on and yearn for them continually, but there will be nothing you can do.
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A people whom you have not known shall eat up the produce of your ground and all your labors, and you will never be anything but oppressed and crushed continually.
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You shall be driven mad by the sight of what you see. The Lord will strike you on the knees and legs with sore boils, from which you cannot be healed, for the sole of your foot to the crown of your head.
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The Lord will bring you and your king, whom you have set, to a nation which neither you nor your fathers have known, and there you shall serve other gods, wood and stone.
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You shall become a horror, a proverb, and a taunt among all the people where the
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Lord drives you. You shall bring out much seed to the field, but you will gather in little, for the locusts will consume it.
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You shall plant and cultivate vineyards, but you will neither drink of the wine nor gather the grapes, for the worm will devour them.
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You shall have olive trees throughout your territory, but you will not anoint yourself with the oil, for your olives will drop off.
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You shall have sons and daughters, but they will not be yours, for they will go into captivity. The cricket shall possess all your trees and the produce of your ground.
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The alien who is among you shall rise above you higher and higher, but you will go down lower and lower.
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He shall lend to you, but you will not lend to him. He shall be the head, and you will be the tail.
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Rather grim. Let's pray. Lord, we thank you for your son and the blessing that it is to be part of your family.
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Lord, I thank you for this congregation and the blessing that they've been to me personally and to my family.
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Just thank you for today that we can gather and worship you with others.
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Pray, Lord, that we would take full advantage of this time. Pray for those among us who are sick and not feeling well.
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I just pray, Lord, that you would enable them to use this time to draw closer to you with no other distractions.
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Just pray, Lord, for Michael as he comes, that you would bless the words of his mouth, the words that you've said on his heart.
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Just give him continued boldness to speak the truth of the Lord to us. Just bless our time here today.
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In Christ's name, amen. You can be seated. Well, the other reason
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I like December is we get to sing Christmas hymns and songs.
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And these are standards that I hope you've grown up with. If you haven't, now's the time to grow up with it.
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So we're going to sing Hark the Herald Angels, all three verses,
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O little town of Bethlehem, the first and the fourth, And joy to the world, all four.
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So you sing out from the heart. Hark the herald angels sing,
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Glory to the newborn king, Peace on earth and mercy mild,
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God and sinners reconciled. Joyfully nations rise,
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Join the triumph of the skies, With the angelic host proclaim,
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Christ is born in Bethlehem. Hark the herald angels sing,
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Glory to the newborn king.
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Christ my highest heaven adored, Christ the everlasting
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Lord, Late in time behold him come,
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Offspring of a virgin's womb. Veiled in flesh the
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Godhead see, Hail the incarnate deity,
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Pleased as man with men to dwell, Jesus our
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Emmanuel. Hark the herald angels sing,
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Glory to the newborn king.
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Hail the heaven -born prince of peace, Hail the son of righteousness,
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Light and life to all he brings, Risen with healing in his wings,
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Mild he lays his glory by,
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Heaven and men no more may die, Born to raise the sons of earth,
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Born to give them second birth. Hark the herald angels sing,
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Glory to the newborn king.
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141, O Little Town. O little town of Bethlehem, How still we see thee lie!
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Above thy deep and dreamless sleep
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The silent stars go by. Yet in thy dark streets shineth
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The everlasting light. The hopes and fears of all the years
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Are met in thee tonight. Be child of God, descend on us,
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We press down our sin and enter in,
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Be born in us today. We hear the
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Christmas angels Ring the great glad tidings now.
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O come to us, abide with us,
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Our Lord Emmanuel. His come, let earth receive her
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King, Let every heart prepare him room to sleep,
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And through him nature the
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Savior raise, Let men their songs employ.
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For fields and floods, Rocks, hills, and plains,
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We heed the sounding joy, We heed the sounding joy.
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No more let sins and sorrows grow, Nor thorns and pestilence grow,
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He comes to make his blessings flow.
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For as the curse is found, For as the curse is found, For as, for as the curse is found,
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He rules the world with truth and grace, And makes the nations prove
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The glories of his righteousness,
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And wonders of his love, And wonders of his love,
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And wonders of his love. Let's go to the
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Lord in prayer this morning. Thank him for the day. Ask his blessing on our time.
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Father, we do thank you that through our good and heavenly Father that you have gathered us here today.
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You know what we need. We need this word, your word, more than our necessary food.
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You have made us in your image so that as you mediate your goodness through us you will manifest your glory in us.
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Our lives are designed by you and we are to be directed toward you.
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And we thank you for Jesus Christ, our Savior and our Sovereign, who redeems us from sin, who brings us out of the dominion of sin and darkness and brings us into your kingdom that we may praise you and glorify you as we ought.
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I thank you for the praise that is offered up today, the joy it is to gather together and confess our faith in Christ and our joy in you.
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I pray now as we look at your word and as we consider the truth of this text that you would fill us with your
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Holy Spirit so that what is spoken to us here, what we read here, would be driven deeply into our lives, deeply into our hearts, that you would have your way in us, that we would be the amen on earth of your will declared in heaven.
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We look to you and ask for these graces and do so only in the name of Jesus Christ, the one with whom you are well pleased.
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Amen. Let's open our
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Bibles and turn to Psalm 115. We're going to be looking at verses 1 through 18 and in a moment we'll be paying attention to verses 4 through 8 this morning.
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Some of you are wondering why we're not looking at a classic Christmas text because it is already the second
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Advent Sunday. We're in December and so on, but I guarantee you this is a
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Christmas text. So you just hold on. And I'm working on the other one and it won't be a classic
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Christmas text either, but it'll still be a Christmas text, okay? So let's look at this passage today, especially verses 4 through 8 of Psalm 115.
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We are to praise the Lord, who is our help and our shield.
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We are to praise the Lord, our help and our shield. Psalm 115 is part of the great halal, the great hymn that the
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Jews would sing in and around Passover, praising the Lord. These are psalms which teach us the very fundamentals of praise, what it means to worship
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God. What does he want to be worshipped for? How would he like to be worshipped? He's the one who gets to set the agenda.
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And so we have to pay attention. I mean, we are made for worship. We're made in God's image. Worship is our number one duty.
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And so here we have instruction. Here we have example. Here we have direction. It is so helpful to us.
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And this morning, I think it'll be a true blessing to prepare our minds for this
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Advent season, to direct us to the wonders of the gift that God has given us in his
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Son, Jesus Christ. Well, if you would stand with me, I'm going to read
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Psalm 115 for us, and let us hear this psalm of praise, this hallelujah to the
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Lord. This is the word of the Lord. Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to your name give glory, because of your love and kindness, because of your truth.
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Why should the nations say, Where now is their God? Our God is in the heavens.
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He does whatever he pleases. Their idols are silver and gold, the work of man's hands.
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They have mouths, but they cannot speak. They have eyes, but they cannot see.
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They have ears, but they cannot hear. They have noses, but they cannot smell.
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They have hands, but they cannot feel. They have feet, but they cannot walk.
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They cannot make a sound with their throat. Those who make them will become like them, everyone who trusts in them.
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O Israel, trust in the Lord. He is their help and their shield.
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O house of Aaron, trust in the Lord. He is their help and their shield. You who fear the
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Lord, trust in the Lord. He is their help and their shield. The Lord has been mindful of us.
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He will bless us. He will bless the house of Israel. He will bless the house of Aaron.
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He will bless those who fear the Lord, the small together with the great.
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May the Lord give you increase, you and your children. May you be blessed to the Lord, maker of heaven and earth.
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The heavens are the heavens of the Lord, but the earth is given to the sons of men.
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The dead do not praise the Lord, nor do any who go down into silence. But as for us, we will bless the
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Lord from this time forth and forever. Praise the
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Lord. This is the word of God. Thanks be to God. You may be seated.
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As a family, we have been reading through some of the Christmas passages in the
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Bible, and there are a lot of them. And you know how fast I like to go. So we are just now done with Genesis, and we're hoping to make it to the
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Gospels before Advent actually arrives. But there's a lot of Christmas passages in the Bible.
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And one of the ones that we know as a classic comes from Isaiah 9. And you'll recognize it when
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I read verses 1 and 2. But there will be no more gloom for her who was in anguish.
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In earlier times, he treated the land of Zebulun and the land of Naphtali with contempt. But later on, he shall make it glorious by the way of the sea on the other side of the
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Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles. And this is the part that's really familiar.
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The people who walk in darkness will see a great light. Those who live in a dark land, the light will shine on them.
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Now that's a Christmas passage. It's a promise of the Messiah. It's a promise of a light coming into a world of darkness.
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That's just chock full of Christmas themes, isn't it? And we see the fulfillment of that passage, especially in Matthew chapter 4, when
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Jesus is in his ministry and preaching the Gospel to the
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Gentiles of Galilee. It showcases his power as he declares the advent of his kingdom.
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But this language of light, light coming into darkness, that is also attached to his birth, his initial advent.
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And we read about this in John chapter 1. In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the
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Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through him, and apart from him nothing has come into being that has come into being.
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In him was life, listen to this, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness did not comprehend it.
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Some translations say, overwhelm it. So this light cannot be contained or overcome.
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There came a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness to testify about the light, so that all might believe through him.
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He was not the light, but he came to testify about the light. There was the true light which coming into the world enlightens every man.
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There is no light for men unless they have the light of Christ. There is no light for men unless they have the light of Christ.
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What a gift God has given that he sent his only begotten Son into the world.
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Without the light of Advent, without the light of the Incarnation, without the light of the Messiah, there is nothing left but the pagan darkness of idolatry.
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It's one or the other. Read Romans 1. There is the truth, and then there is the lie.
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Two options. We have the light of Christ, or we have the darkness of pagan idolatry.
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So we are to praise the Lord, Jesus Christ. He is our help and our shield. He is our clarifying and revealing help.
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He is our living and our true shield. He is the one who delivers us from idols.
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He is the one who defends us against deceit. Now, despair.
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Despair is the number one symptom of paganism. Despair is the number one symptom of paganism.
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Everyone's about symptoms these days, aren't they? What kind of symptoms do you have?
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That doesn't sound good. Every time somebody coughs, everybody kind of gets a little nervous.
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But I'll tell you, the number one symptom of this year has not been the cough, and it has not been a fever.
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The number one symptom of this year has been despair. Everybody's afraid, hopeless, calling it the end.
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Everything's bad, and it's going south. Despair has been the number one symptom of this year, and it's been on full display.
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And it shows us what kind of a pagan culture in which we live. Despair is the number one symptom of paganism, and we're going to see that in our text today.
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No hope. Now, we want to trust in the Lord as our help and our shield.
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We want to give Him praise accordingly. If you want to trust the Lord as your help and shield, like this psalm calls us to do, the starting point for that, living confidently with the
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Lord as your help, the Lord as your shield, the way you start that is by praising
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Him accordingly. He's worthy of that kind of praise. He indeed is our help.
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He indeed is our shield. In verses 1 through 3, last time we talked about the exaltation of our
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God. Our God is in the heavens. He does what He pleases. And now we're going to look at the excoriation of other gods.
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If you're wondering about the word excoriation, it begins with an E, and it fits with my other four points.
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And it means, it means mercilessly going after someone with a serrated edge in your words.
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And that's what happens in this text. The pagans, notice in verses 1 through 3, the pagans project, the pagans project.
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They mock the believers. They say, where now is your
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God? We talked about that mockery from Sennacherib and that mockery from Nebuchadnezzar.
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Where now is your God? They say. This is a classic mockery of the pagans against the believers. But they are projecting their mockery as actually their own condemnation.
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They are the real fools because they don't worship the one true God. They worship other things. They worship things that were made after their own dead imagination.
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Things that are of no help and things that lead to death, which is why despair is the number one symptom of idolatry, of paganism.
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Their idols, we read, their idols are silver and gold. This is the origin of the gods of men. Their idols are silver and gold, the work of man's hands.
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And so that's why the pagans project. They don't want to deal with the reality of what they worship. So they project it on believers.
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They mock God. They say, where now is your God? That is the perfect question to ask them.
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That is so perfectly suited to ask pagans, to ask idolaters.
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Where now are your gods? I suppose the answer is something along the following.
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Where now are your gods? I suppose wherever you last put them down. Wherever you left them behind.
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Wherever they got put or they still are. Unless someone stole them, you better go check. Where now are your gods?
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That's the question to ask the pagans. You see, this is an utter contrast.
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Our God is in the heavens. He does whatever He pleases. He is exalted. He is enthroned. Nobody put Him there.
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He's always been there. And He does all that He pleases. He is active, alive, and powerful.
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Now, where are your gods? Where are your gods? Now, listen to this principle because we're going to come back to it.
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Hosea chapter 8, verse 6 lays down this principle. A craftsman made it, so it is not
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God. That's easy enough to remember. But it really needs to be remembered and it really needs to be applied.
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A craftsman made it, so it is not God. Hosea 8, verse 6.
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Now, why is this important for us? Now, we don't live in a culture where we're walking around and we see images of animals or images of hideous -looking creatures set up in little shrines at the crossroads, at the intersections of our streets or in the mall.
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We're not walking by little shrines that people have left all sorts of junk around.
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Now, some cultures have that, but do we really have that? Listen, 1
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John 5, 21. Little children, guard yourselves from idols. 1 John 5, 21. Little children, guard yourselves from idols because they don't show up in that form only.
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It's not just about those hideous little statues. Those strange -looking pictures in their shrines and everything else.
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Little children, guard yourselves from idols. If a craftsman made it, it is not
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God. If a man makes something, either with his mind or his hands, it is not worth worshiping.
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Man is limited by his resources, by his money, his imagination, his skill, his strength.
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If he ever carves out a crude figure from wood or constructs an ideal God in his mind, either way, he's breaking the first and second commandments, making another
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God in order to worship it. Another God besides the one true God.
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Now, all these gods are fundamentally the same. Of course, they function differently in terms of how they're expressed and how they're worshiped.
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I mean, the God of the Quran is different than the God of Hillsong, but they're both invented by men.
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They're both invented by men. If you believe in a
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God that is essentially described to you only through the personal experiences of others, or if you believe in a
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God based on the ideals that you personally find most attractive, you're worshiping a false
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God. You're making God in your image rather than worshiping the
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God who made you in His. This is the great and atrocious sin of men that we are serial idolaters.
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Now, the origin of the gods of men is what? They are the work of man's hands. Their idols are silver and gold.
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And if a craftsman made it, it is not God. We shouldn't be worshiping it. And so, the idea is that we would reject all the gods of men, that we would repent from manufacturing gods to suit our fancy.
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But the true God is revealed through His Word. Unfailingly so. Repenting from idolatry involves us learning who the real
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God is from Scripture, and He has plainly revealed Himself here. He knows we're little children. He knows our frame.
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He didn't put it far out of reach. Depend on Him. The origin of the gods of men, verse 4, but notice the uselessness of the gods of men in verses 5 through 7.
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The uselessness of the gods of men. They have mouths, but they cannot speak. They have eyes, but they cannot see.
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They have ears, but they cannot hear. They have noses, but they cannot smell. They have hands, but they cannot feel.
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They have feet, but they cannot walk. They cannot make a sound with their throat.
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So what are these? Are they gods? Or are they action figures?
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Are they gods? Or are they toys? Well, toys.
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Indeed, all possessions can easily be made. They can be made gods by their owners. But these gods are not really toys, ultimately.
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They are demonic deceptions. That's what Paul says. These idols, these gods are demonic deceptions.
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And ancient idols were as hideous, hideous as their modern counterparts. Look it up in a
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Bible dictionary or a Bible encyclopedia. Look it up online. Find some pictures of Baal and Asherah and Molech and Chemosh.
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Find some pictures of the gods of the Greeks and the Romans. They're hideous.
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Look at the idols and the gods of the Hindus. They're all hideous. And the modern counterparts are as well.
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They represent power. They stand in for life forces. But they are actually bottomless cisterns of despair.
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That's what these things are. They are bottomless cisterns of despair. Why? Because we see their limitations.
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They have the appearance of life but none of their benefits. They have the promise of life but never deliver.
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They cannot answer our questions. They cannot relay to us wisdom. Their mouths are dead.
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They cannot see our devoted attention. They cannot see our struggles in life. Their eyes are dead.
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They cannot hear our petitions. They cannot smell the incense we offer. Their ears and noses are dead.
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They cannot receive the gifts we give nor can they give anything to us. They cannot collect our tears in a bottle or write down all of our days in a book because their hands are dead.
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They do not move to our aid. They cannot even groan. Their feet and throats are dead.
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Their mouths, eyes, ears, noses, hands, feet and throats are dead. Utterly dead.
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They have never lived in the least. Thus, they are utterly useless.
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They cannot tell us of the origin of the universe. They cannot see the end from the beginning. They are dead. They cannot deliver us from the wrath of the
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Holy God. They are dead. They cannot recreate the world in righteousness and bestow eternal life on the innumerable multitude.
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The craft of men is dead. However, the
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Son of God is alive. The Son of God is alive.
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Conceived by the miraculous generation of the Holy Spirit in the womb of the
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Virgin Mary, the full and complete human nature of Jesus was united in eternal hypostatic union with the full and complete divine nature of the second person of the
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Godhead, God the Son. He is Emmanuel. He is God with us. The gods lay all around us.
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They are dead rocks upon which the ghost ships of humanity are breaking apart. But into this night,
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Christ has come. The light of the world. Born of Mary.
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And look at the infant. The hope of the world. His mouth moves and sucks.
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His eyes are all for his mother. His nose and his ears are small.
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But hearing, hearing the busy night around him. Smelling that special odor of the feed trough.
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His hands open and close. They grasp Mary's robe, scratch his face.
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His feet kick. His throat is full of sounds. Cuing to crying. Real and full, sinless humanity united with real and full, saving divinity, the
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Christ child. The unblemished Lamb of God. We're to worship him.
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Christ our King. May this be a season that we lay off the idols and worship our
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Savior. And so let's get very specific. Let's be very concrete about this.
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Let's take aim at the bull's eye and not pretend like we don't know what is going on in our world today.
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Let's not play around and apply the Scripture loosely and indefinitely.
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Let's apply the Scripture rightly. For the word pierces to the heart of the matter. The idol of science is dead.
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The idol of science is dead. It has never even lived.
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It is the state religion. It is the patron god of our nation.
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It is the imperial cult. But it is a worship of death by the dead.
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Consider it this way. It cannot mediate life through invention.
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It cannot heal us through medicine. It offers no enlightenment through experiment nor unity through dogma.
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Gaia, Asclepius, Athena, Apollos, every demonic shade of this wretched religion, environmentalism, positivism, pharmaceuticalism, materialism.
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Their priests and their priestesses are powerful. Their devotees are numerous.
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Their temple is richly adorned. Their sacrifice is abundant. And their voice, the immoral compass of our world.
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Have you noticed that the mercies of the wicked are cruel? The mercies of the wicked are cruel.
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The god of science, the idol of science is dead. And its mercies are cruel.
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Why are abortion and euthanasia, gender fluidity and the ritual transvestite cutting of the flesh, why is the quarantining of the healthy and the blind trust in every new medical policy and potion, why are these all the dogma of the day?
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Why are these things ratified, enforced and deified in the name of science?
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It's true because it's science. It's authoritative because it's science. You must obey because it's science.
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Why is also the fear of sickness and the dread of death so thick upon our land?
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Why is despair the number one symptom of our culture? Because the dead god of science has been praised and honored and glorified as our help and our shield.
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Dearly beloved, it is not our help and it is not our shield. Medical advancements are welcome.
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Medicine is a tool. And the tools of today are a lot better than the tools of yesterday. I watch videos of people using the tools from 200 years ago trying to chop down a tree, and then
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I watch people using tools today, the tools of today chopping down a tree, and boy, the tools of today are so much better.
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Some people have an affinity for the old tools, and that's kind of cool, you know, how to use the old tools. New tools are nice to have.
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Medical advancements are welcome. Medicine is a tool, but it is, listen, severely limited and thoroughly flawed.
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Medicine, science, is severely limited. It is thoroughly flawed.
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How do we know that? Remember the principle, Hosea 8 .6? A craftsman made it, so it is not
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God. God is flawless. God is unlimited.
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Man is flawed thoroughly. Man is limited severely how much more the stuff he makes.
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It is useful. Science and medicine are very useful, listen, as a faulty means in sovereign hands.
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As a faulty means in sovereign hands, but it is absolutely useless as a
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God. Science cannot deliver you from death or from men or from slavery or from snares.
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Science cannot heal the world, cannot undo depravity, cannot save you from even such a disease like COVID -19.
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If we cannot trust God when the tree is green, and the tree is green still in our country, the tree is green.
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I'm not saying it's awesome. I'm saying the tree is green. If we can't trust when the tree is green, what are we going to do when it's dry?
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I encourage you, as we have been talking for half a year now or more, take your precautions according to your liberty in Jesus Christ, and do so, and we don't condemn each other.
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Wear your mask, don't wear your mask. Distance, don't distance. Do what you need to do in your liberty in Jesus Christ.
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Make sure of your conviction. Amen and amen. But it is not fitting for the bride of Christ to whore after other gods.
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Science is dead. It is not worth worshiping. And the reason why we need this warning, and the reason why we need to rightly and deeply and carefully apply this truth about false gods is because of the results, the results that come about from worshiping idols.
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Look at verse 8. Those who make them will become like them, everyone who trusts in them.
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Oh, the idol maker and the idol worshiper will become like the idol. Useless.
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Useless. Those who make dead gods, those who trust dead gods, have nowhere to progress but into the deadness.
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How does Romans 3 put it? Their mouths are full of deceitful poison. There is no fear of God before their eyes.
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Their noses crave no righteous odor. Their hands do no good, not even a little. Their feet are swift to shed blood.
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Destruction and misery are in their ways. In the way of peace they have not known. Their throat is nothing but an open tomb, the entrance to a deep and spiritual death.
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Those who worship these dead gods become like them. We must all repent of exchanging the truth of God for the lie.
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We must turn away from worshiping the creature rather than the creator who is blessed forever. Amen. What's the result if we do not turn away?
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Listen, you have people in your life who believe that science is going to save them.
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Turn them away from that. Something may help you. God may use a faulty means in his sovereign hands to help you.
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He may answer some prayers through that. Praise be to God, but science is not going to save you. Only God can save you.
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Only Christ can save you. What is the end result? And I'm going to read this awful scene, but I want you to see it from the
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Scripture. What happens when somebody makes and then worships false gods?
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I want you to see the harrowing picture straight from the
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Scripture. Isaiah 44, 18 -20. This is the conclusion of a story of a man who goes and chops down a tree, cuts up the wood.
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Half of it he builds a fire to cook his meal. With half of it he carves it into an idol that he can worship.
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Same tree. This is what it says, Isaiah 44, 18 -20.
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They do not know, nor do they understand, for He, capital
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H, God, this is judgment, He has smeared over their eyes so that they cannot see, and their hearts so that they cannot comprehend.
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No one recalls, nor is there knowledge or understanding to say, I have burned half of it in the fire, and I've also baked bread over its coals.
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I roast meat and eat it, and then I make the rest of it into an abomination. I fall down before a block of wood.
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He feeds on ashes. A deceived heart has turned
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Him aside, and He cannot deliver Himself. He cannot deliver Himself, nor say,
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Is there not a lie in my right hand? The wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth and unrighteousness.
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And how is it that His wrath is revealed? He turns them over to their sin, turns them over to a reprobate mind.
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So, you will become like that which you worship. You will become like that which you worship.
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Now, that warning is not to be dismissed or underestimated in the least.
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Even in the passage there in Isaiah, it's clearly stated,
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He worships a block of wood, and then what does He become like? He's as dense as a block of wood.
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You will become like that which you worship. And if you worship something that is dead and cannot help, that's why despair rolls off you.
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This warning should be taken, actually, in its fullest and most hope -filled sense.
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When we worship what we worship, we become like. So, when we worship the Lord, when we worship
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Christ, revealed in this Word, when we fear the
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Lord, when we trust in Jesus Christ as our mediator, when we honor and glorify our
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Savior and Sovereign Jesus Christ, what happens to us? What happens to us when we fix our minds on Jesus Christ, who is at the right hand of the
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Father? What happens when we fix our minds on things above where Christ is, rather than the things that are on the earth?
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What happens when we rightly identify and praise our true help and our shield?
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What happens to us? Do we put off the old and put on the new? Do we not experience that transformation?
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Are we not then more and more conformed to and renewed in the image of the invisible
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God, Jesus Christ Himself? We become like that which we worship. That's good news. Worship Christ.
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Become Christ -like. Worship God. Become godly. Jesus Christ Himself.
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Now, there is one worthy of worship. There is one worthy of worship.
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He is not dead. He is very much alive. Nothing wrong with His mouth and eyes, ears, nose, hands, feet or throat.
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He is the living one who is dead. And behold, He is alive forevermore.
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He holds the keys of death and Hades. He is clothed in a robe that reaches to His feet and girded across His chest with a golden sash.
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His head, His hair are like white wool, like snow.
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His eyes are a flame of fire. His feet are like burnished bronze glowing in a furnace.
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And His voice is like the sound of many waters. In His right hand, He holds
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His people. And out of His mouth comes a sharp two -edged sword. And His face is like the sun shining in its strength.
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O Christians, trust in Christ the Lord. He is your help and shield.
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O Sunnyside, trust in Christ the Lord. He is our help and shield.
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O you who fear the Lord, trust in Jesus Christ. He is our help and our shield.
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Hallelujah. Let's pray. Father, I thank You for the time You've given us in Your Word.
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Put our attention upon Your light, the light of the world, Jesus Christ. And as we worship
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Him, may we become like Him and ourselves be the light of this world.
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May this season be a season where, O Lord, we refuse to honor despair, but we joyously, with great hope, worship
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Christ and honor You, our God, who is in the heavens, doing whatever You please.
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We pray all these things for the sake of Your Son, Jesus Christ. In His name, amen.
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Amen. Amen. Please stand and we'll sing our song of benediction,
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No Other Name. No Other Name. In the name of Jesus.
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No other name but the name of the Lord. Jesus is worthy of glory and worthy of honor and worthy of power and of praise.
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His name is exalted far above the earth.
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His name is high above the heavens. His name is exalted far above the earth.
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Give glory and honor in the name of Jesus.
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No other name but the name of the Lord. No other name but the name of Jesus.
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Jesus is worthy of glory and worthy of honor and worthy of power and of praise.
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The love of the Father and the grace of the Son and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all.