143. The Curse Upon The Jews

Jesus was announcing an open court that the paternity results had come in and the Jews of that first century Were not children of God, but they were instead the bastard children of hell. Hello everyone and welcome back to the broadcast where we prod the sheep and beat the wolf.

This is episode 143 the curse upon the Jews. Oh everyone and welcome back to the broadcast. We are now in our seventh episode of this new revelation series. And our goal has been to simply understand the most complicated book in the Bible but to do that we want to do it in a way where you don't need charts or decoder rings or eschatological shamans that Proliferate on TBN in order to understand these things.

No our goal has been for us to Understand this without bringing a theological system of doom and gloom Upon the text and pound trying to pound it in like a child trying to cram a square peg into a round hole instead.

We want to derive meaning from the text. We want to let the text tell us what it means. And what the original author was attempting to communicate to the original audience and then submit our lives under that inspired Meaning because that is as Peter said in John 6 the words of life and where else should we ever go?

But to them that's been her posture so far in this series and because of that our attitude has been that we are going to totally and completely Reject the tabloid style in time hysteria that's being peddled by the modern-day dis bees.

Which has led to a defeatist mindset in the Church of the Living God my after my after my whether it was intentional or Unwitting has been foisted upon the modern church telling her that we are always Losing and that the world is ever going from bad to worse and that the kingdom of God is shrinking and that the most significant spiritual exercise that we could all be doing is Planning our escape from the world instead of trying to build the world and bring it into conformity with Jesus's vision this Houdini like Mentality waiting for the right moment to disappear has caused the church to fail.

It's caused the Saints of God to be fearful and depressed and it's caused the world around us to fall into deeper levels of Repugnancy as the church has all but wasted away into complete irrelevancy. Now with that it is clear to me that Dispensationalism is the problem.

It is a doctrine created in the salt mines of hell because what wherever it is sprinkled on the church She becomes fat sick and nearly dead. She becomes depressed and dejected which are not attributes that arise out of a relationship with God.

They are certainly not fruits of the Holy Spirit. But they are carefully gift-wrapped gift-wrapped poisons from an enemy that wants to render God's elect immobile in panic fear and dread. And I'm not saying that dispensationalists are not Christian.

I would never make that claim. I am saying they're deceived and I want us to think about these things in a very obvious way. How could such a corrosive theology honor Jesus when it's so perfectly? Devastates his royal bride instead of robust exegesis Dispensationalists have employed what I like to call exit.

Jesus looking for their exit everywhere in Scripture. But as we've pointed out, it's not there. Instead of joyfully working to see the world conform to his image. They've been looking for their off-ramp or their escape and that is not good biblical theology.

So because of that and I don't really care how many Dispensationalists drop into the comment section like a prowling Chester lurking on a playground. I'm trying to call I'm trying to call it what it is.

That it's false teaching that it's heresy not a damnable heresy. But it is heresy and I'm trying to teach what the Bible actually says even if it ruffles a few little rapture feathers. I'm going to keep teaching what the Bible says because.

Because that's what's gonna heal the church not Dispensationalism. Dispensationalism is corrosive as battery acid to the church and for the last hundred years The only hundred years in all of human history that dispensationalism has been the dominant view it has destroyed the church the once vigorous Church of Jesus Christ, though that had built cathedrals and Christendom is now been reduced to the Metaphorical equivalent of a jittery toothless meth addict from Chicago rather than the warrior that she was supposed to be.

If Dispensationalism were a pill you would stop taking it when your hair fell out. You would stop taking it because it's poison now. That's what we the church have got to do. We've got to bury this destructive doctrine doctrine in the pages of history put it back on the shelf where it belongs and move on Into faithfulness.

And that's why I've been doing this series to show How these things that the dis piece have twisted have already occurred and because they've already occurred we can have great Confidence that Christ is leading his church on to and unto victory now.

I Know this is not what today's episode is about a railing against the dispensationalist. But I am tired of seeing the church living out a loser mentality and retreating from the world living like cowards and refusing to live for Christ and Refusing to live like Christ today because we're too busy trying to capture or catch our rapture tomorrow.

This has got to stop and it's one of the reasons like I said that I'm doing this series now. If this is the first time that you're watching this show, I would give you a hearty. Welcome. Tell you thank you for being here and I would also give you a recommendation that you push the pause button on this episode and Go back and listen to the six prior episodes that we've been doing in this series because in those episodes We've been providing the critical context that you're going to need in order to navigate what we're talking about today.

Covenant Curses in the Mosaic Covenant

And what are we talking about today? We're talking about the curses that have come upon Judah. We're continuing along with the same topic that we had last week showing how the Tribulation has already happened and before we get into all of that new evidence.

I want to remind us of where we have been. So with for just a moment just to set the context just a little bit last week on the broadcast. We ignite we ignited a few claymore minds in the direction of dispensationalism and hopefully we woke them up to the reality that the word tribulation does not mean a Long into the future seven-year period of unfathomable suffering at the hands of a European Antichrist.

What the word actually means? It's the ellipsis and it's Greek. It's a general word that applies to any period of time where people are suffering. It's a word that means pressure. It's a word that means crushing.

It's a word that means something is painful. It doesn't mean a Future period of Apocalyptic suffering. It's not a proper noun. It's a general noun that work that occurs in any time of human suffering.

For instance, if you have a dog or a cat that dies you're going through a tribulation at the ellipsis. You can have a thalypsus when for instance grandma got ran over by a reindeer or any other number of things that cause a person Have heartache and grief and feel pressure as we pointed out.

This word occurs hundreds of times in the Bible and it never points to a specific future apocalyptic super cycle of Terror, it just doesn't now along with that last week. We proved how Jesus wasn't talking about events that happened in the book the late great planet earth or the left behind series but instead he was talking about a Tribulation that was gonna happen in the first century and it was gonna be poured out on his beloved bride the church.

It was gonna be poured out at the hands of the bloodthirsty Jews who hated and crucified Jesus and abhorred his followers to the point of murder. That's the tribulation. That the Jews were murdering Christians.

That's what the tribulation is. That's what Jesus means by it and we saw that that's the only faithful reading of the text by the context of Matthew 24 in the linguistic case that we Proved from the scriptures now after looking at the language.

We then turned to two examples of the word the ellipsis in the Greek Old Testament Which we call the Septuagint and from those two examples alone one of them in Exodus and one of them Deuteronomy. We were able to draw some very important biblical and theological parallels for what Jesus was predicting in Matthew 24.

And what we saw was how Jesus was intentionally comparing the people of God in the book of Exodus to the first century Church. And we saw how Jesus a few verses later would compare the first century Jews to the Egyptians of old and by doing this Jesus was showing how his disciples Just as Pharaoh was oppressing Israel back then with relentless cruelty his disciples are going to be oppressed and go through a Philipsis a tribulation in the first century at the hands of the Jews and what he was also showing Was that the Jews of Jesus's day had become like Egypt oppressing the church and infuriating and and Causing the rage of Yahweh to be poured out on them leading to their devastation and their disaster like the children of Israel in Exodus.

The church was gonna go through a momentary Philipsis and like the Egyptians drowning in the Red Sea the first century Jews were gonna go through a great Philipsis which is gonna signify their doom. Now once we established that Exodus motif, then we turn to the second example of Philipsis in the Septuagint and we learned how the Levitical and Deuteronomic Curse language from the Mosaic Covenant, which comes out of Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28.

We're gonna be poured out on the Jews by doing this. We prove that Israel's 1 ,500 years of Covenant infidelity had finally warranted the snipers laser To center upon her chest and the trigger to be pulled from Mount Sinai to Mount Calvary.

The Jews were a stiff-necked people who killed the prophets Sacrificed their children in the fires of Moloch and Baal and they played the whore with every idol Under every tree with every nation and even thought that they were gonna get away with murdering.

God's one and only Son By Jesus marching into the city of Jerusalem the city that was plotting to kill him and Announcing seven woes upon them in Matthew 23 He was telling everybody that they were not gonna get away with it.

God had not forgotten her crimes he was not blind to the Injustices and the inequities that she had piled up high as heaven and by announcing these seven perfect woes upon her Jesus was starting the countdown.

He was pulling the Covenant curse lever that within a single generation would render Jerusalem and Judea no more and Then finally in last week's episode we tied all of it together in the book of Revelation where we saw how the early church Endured fierce persecutions and tribulations like in Revelation 2 9 through 10.

We saw how the Great Tribulation was reserved for the Jewish oppressors Revelation 6 12 through 17. And we saw how the very ones who cried out his blood be on us and our children. Were the very ones who were crushed under the weight of God's Covenantal wrath like sheep being led to the slaughter in Revelation 19 marching towards their doom until they were eradicated.

That has led us to a consistent conclusion that Matthew 24 and the book of Revelation are not about a future sci-fi pandemonium but a faithful accounting of how Old Covenant Judaism and its Custodians the longest Jews were crushed by God and sent away from him like a newly discovered adulterous Receiving her freshly printed certificate of divorce.

Revelation 17 1 through 8 Jeremiah 3 8 now. That is where I'd like for us to continue today by jumping right back in to this narrative of Philipsis and tribulation and I want us to Examine the rest of the material that we weren't able to cover last week today.

We're gonna look at how the Jews came under a curse of God and that curse is what led them to perpetrate Tribulations. We're gonna see how there's three Dramatic curses that are poured out upon them in the New Testament and we're gonna see how those curses Fueled them towards violence Madness jealousy and a hardening of heart where they could not be saved.

What we're gonna look at is how the covenant curses Defined the Jews of the first century and we're also gonna look at how those same curses define her as a people today. Last week. I said that this is gonna be one of my most ambitious episodes and talking about such a controversial topic this week.

As the cursing that has come upon the Jews is clearly right in the same vein as that. So I covet your prayers that I would do this biblically faithfully and in a godly way and with that. Let us jump into part one the Jews and the threat of curse.

How Covenant Theology Shapes the Bible

Now to understand how the Jews actually became cursed. How did a curse fall upon them? We have to first understand and immerse ourself in covenant thinking. Not taking covenant theology seriously is one of the most significant reasons that dispensationalist and modern Christians Misunderstand the Bible because covenant theology is the backbone of biblical theology.

Covenants are how a thrice. Holy God stoops down in order to establish a relationship with sinful man. They are agreements that are cut in blood sealed with the promises of God and their stipulations are Binding upon the people who've chosen to enter into that relationship with their creator through covenants God extends his hand to his people drawing them into fellowship promising blessings for their fidelity but also warning them of paralyzing curses if they persist in their rebellion.

Deuteronomy 28 is a great example in this way covenants in the Bible are relationships that God and man enter into and become forever binding upon both parties when they agree to the terms which opens up humans to unimaginable blessings if they're faithful and curses if they are not depending on which direction of faithfulness they end up on and As you study these covenants, you're soon going to realize that all of them follows a very similar pattern in their Constitution.

So first, let me give you a little bit of the pattern of Covenant so that you'll understand what I mean and you'll understand what covenant curses are. It's very very important first. First pattern is that God is always the one who initiates the relationship with sinful man.

Whether it be Noah Abraham Adam or Israel and Mount Sinai. It is always God who takes the first step and it's always God who calls people to himself. Not people who call God unto them. Many examples of the Genesis 9 8 through 9 Genesis 12 1 Genesis 19 or Exodus 19 4 through 6 just to name a few.

Now the second aspect of covenant is that after God has pursued the person the Relationship now comes with stipulations. God doesn't make relationships with no rules. There are terms that God lays out that must be followed in order for him to share his holy presence with sinful men.

And for the covenants remain intact those stipulations must be upheld. An example of this is Genesis 17 1 through 2 or Exodus 20 1 through 7 now. These covenant stipulations are not on the level of suggestions.

They are not. They're not opinions by God. They are not What he hopes is gonna happen. These are mandates. They are divine ordinances that must be obeyed if you're gonna be in relationship with God because if you don't then you Forfeit the same grace that is protecting you from his holy wrath.

If you're gonna be in relationship with a holy God You need his protection because his holiness is so furious and so beautiful and so perfect that it would rip you apart. To disobey the covenant is to forfeit the grace that keeps you standing in his presence without being harmed.

That is the second element of every covenant is that it comes with stipulations? Third it also comes with future blessings and future curses as a reward for the obedience or the dire Consequences for violating covenant with God and we're gonna get into a few of those in a moment now.

Fourth. After the covenant curses and covenant blessings. Every covenant is sealed with blood which demonstrates its life and death commitment. Genesis 15 9 through 10 is a great example. And then fifth God gives a sign that he is going to be permanently and perpetually Faithful like a rainbow to the covenant of Noah or circumcision to the covenant of Abraham or it's the Sabbath to the covenant of Moses.

These signs are to remind his people that he is the faithful one that he is the one who? Reminds us of his fidelity and he is the one that we can trust who will never break covenant with us. Genesis 9 13 is an example.

Genesis 17 11 Exodus 31 16 through 17. There's many examples and Then finally the sixth aspect of a covenant is that covenants are? Generational. They are made with individuals, but they have effects that last for generations.

They extend beyond the original recipient to their children and to their children's children making the stipulations. The blessings and the curses binding on all future generations who are downstream of this covenant now.

Because all covenants follow this pattern. We should be able to demonstrate that these elements show up in every one of the five Old Testament Covenants with not very much effort and indeed we can. I'm not gonna do that with all five of them.

But I will give you Abraham's covenant as an example because it's a unique covenant. God initiates a covenant with Abram. He calls him out of his paganism and into the good land where God is going to relate with him in Genesis 12 1.

That's the first step. God initiates the relationship. Then in this covenant God commands Abraham with some stipulations because Abraham's gonna be in relationship with God. He needs to know the terms.

Genesis 17 1 says that Abraham is to walk blamelessly before God which is the terms of the Abrahamic Covenant and In terms that Abraham himself could not fulfill and because God decides to Require this of Abraham knowing that Abraham cannot do this.

This is where Abraham's covenant is unique. It has curses in it and it has blessings in it. The blessings are Genesis 12 2 through 3 and they describe how the entire world is going to come under the blessings of the covenant of Abraham.

So long as Abraham is faithful. But what God does in the Abraham's covenant is because Abraham cannot walk perfectly before God. God himself is the one who walks through the severed animal parts in Genesis 15 9 through 17 which is a Demonstration that God is saying may the curses be on me if I am NOT faithful to the covenant.

God does not invite Abraham to walk through the severed animal pieces with him. God is saying Abraham I know you're not gonna be faithful to this but I am still going to give you the blessings of the covenant because I am binding myself to this by walking through these Severed parts.

God is saying may I be ripped apart Just like these animals if I fail to bring the entire world under the blessings of God. Through the seed of Abraham, which Paul tells us is Christ. God is saying to Abraham even if you don't live up to the conditions I'm gonna make sure that I send my son who's gonna walk blamelessly before me and he's gonna be the one who's ripped apart.

So that the blessings of God would come to all the nations. Now in the meantime while all of this was playing out in space and time God reminded Abraham of those blessings by giving him a covenant sign Which is the fourth element and that sign is circumcision.

Genesis 17 10 through 11. So that he would never forget the loving-kindness of the Lord and sometimes the loving-kindness of the Lord cuts you. If you know, you know. Then the Lord gives Abraham offspring so that the covenant will have a legacy and that it will attach itself to all future Generations so that they also will inherit his blessings.

It's covenant is not just with Abraham. It's with Isaac. It's with Jacob. It's with his 12 sons and eventually to work itself out through Jesus to the entire world. That is the covenant with Abraham in a nutshell now.

Unlike the Abrahamic Covenant where God took all of the potential curses upon himself. If that covenant were ever violated the covenant with Moses does not do the same thing in That covenant. The covenant curses very much apply to the people of God if they do not obey the terms of the covenant.

If the Jews who God Ransom out of Egypt and entered into a covenant with at the base of that great mountain called Sinai if they obeyed the terms That God laid out in the covenant then God was going to bless them.

He was gonna rain down Extraordinary blessings upon them like abundant harvest victory over their enemies peace in the land and the very presence of God dwelling upon them in in this beautiful relationship where they are blessed.

Leviticus 16 2 through 13 number 6 24 through 26. Deuteronomy 28 1 through 14 you get to read about the blessings but. But if the people of Israel Disobeyed the stipulations and the ordinances that Yahweh set up in the covenant of Moses There would be horrifying Extraordinary curses that are poured out upon them in Leviticus 26.

In Deuteronomy 28 God warns his people in the most vivid language imaginable. What's gonna happen to them if they break covenant with him? He tells them that their disobedience was going to bring famine so severe that people resorted to cannibalism Which we've talked about last week.

Their cities were going to be reduced to rubble. Their enemies were going to crush them and their survivors were going to be scattered to the very ends of the earth Leviticus 26 31 through 33. Their land Yahweh promises will become a desolation That's overran by wild animals their bodies will lie unburied rotting and exposed upon the ground food for the flying fowl who will peck away at them until there's nothing left.

Leviticus 26 22 and Deuteronomy. God warns that these plagues are going to cling to them and Madness is gonna overtake them and that their lives are gonna hang in such deep abiding Psychological dread that they never have peace in Deuteronomy 28 20 through 22.

Their enemies are gonna besiege their cities until the people are reduced to cannibalism. Deuteronomy 28 52 through 53. Even their sons and daughters are gonna be taken from them sold into slavery while they stand by powerless to stop at Deuteronomy 28 32 and 41.

Among all the covenants in Scripture Obeying and disobeying this one comes with the most specific List of blessings, but also the most dire and biting curses if they disobey and For their part Israel knew the terms God clearly communicated it to the first generation in Leviticus 26 and to the form and to the new generation in Deuteronomy 28.

They heard all of it with their own ears and they said to God all of that That you have spoken we will do Exodus 24 7 they accepted The terms of the covenant and they committed themselves to the stipulations even if Those bitter cursing should be poured out upon them by God.

This is the active covenant Which ensured that that entire generation died in the wilderness for their faithlessness and it was the covenant that the younger generation Renewed in the plains of Moab before they entered the promised land pledging undying loyalty once more to God Deuteronomy 29 1 and Deuteronomy 29 10 through 15 and They didn't just pledge that they were gonna be obedient to the stipulations.

They pledged that the consequences of the covenant would be poured out on them and on their children's children If they were disobedient. When the blood of that covenant was sprinkled upon all of the people of Mount Sinai it was a life-and-death Symbol of the of the gravity of this agreement.

It was a solemn Binding covenant between them and God making the blessings and the cursings real and inescapable. Exodus 24 8 if you're a Jew in the ancient world this covenant was your life. This covenant was your oxygen more than the covenant with Abraham Noah and Adam which applied to Everyone on earth this covenant was peculiar to the Jewish people and it became entwined in their identity as a nation.

But not in the way that it should have which would have led them to obedience. Because as we're going to see in this episode all throughout their history They broke the covenant again and again and again.

They chased after idols. They despised God's law. They hardened their hearts against the prophets that he sent to call them back and for many centuries God chose to be patient with them not giving them the curses that their behavior wholeheartedly deserved and that leads to our second section which is Part two.

Israel and Judah Provoking God to Curse Them

They provoked God to curse them. Now I need to give a warning here and I don't really like to do this because Because the Bible is what I'm gonna be quoting. But the passages that I'm gonna be quoting can be a little bit graphic in nature when it's talking about Israel's whoring and her adulteries.

Especially those with Judah and Ezekiel particularly so I am Giving a little bit of a disclaimer here that if you're a parent and if you're listening to this with a child listen to it beforehand and Determine whether or not This section is appropriate for little ears.

I totally understand if not, I do want to give you that disclaimer because the evidence against Judah in Israel is is Disturbing and gross but it's what the Bible says and I want to be faithful to tell you what the Bible says.

So with that section 1 the Northern Kingdom Israel's history reads like a daytime soap opera where immorality and raunchy Scandals and infidelity are occurring in almost every frame. Yet by the sheer grace of God Israel and Judah were spared from quickly.

Tasting the bitter pill of cursing that their behavior so desperately deserved while being extremely patient with them God allowed Israel and Judah to go decades and centuries. Before pouring out his fury upon her this kindness from God Which should have led her to repentance seemed to embolden her to even more brazen and lurid crimes against her maker and her husband.

The prophets with tongues set ablaze from the Word of God Described her actions. I'm talking about Israel the northern ten tribes as nothing less than spiritual prostitution a whoring after foreign gods and alliances that provoke the fury of God Ezekiel 16 15 through 34 and Hosea 4 12 through 13.

Like a faithless spouse Israel turned her back on the God who rescued her from Egypt and betrothed her at Mount Sinai defiling herself with ongoing displays of Grotesque infidelity. The northern ten tribes that are collectively called Ephraim or Israel in the prophets were the first to feel the crushing weight of the Mosaic curses being poured out upon them.

Their Idolatry and their flagrant rebellion caused God's patience to expire Causing him to enact. The total weight of the curses that we read about in Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28 they were poured out upon the ten northern tribes in 722 BC.

It was this the Assyrian Empire that was used like an instrument of God's wrath like unloaded Colt 45 that put all ten of the northern tribes beneath the ground. Second King 17 6 through 23. It was the curses in Leviticus and Deuteronomy that came to brutal fulfillment in the fall of Samaria.

Their cities were burned and their their walls were laid in ruins. Their women were raped their children were clubbed to death or enslaved and families that survived were broken apart husband separated from their wives and moved to different parts of the Empire so that they would have to remarry and So that they would have to have children with other races so that the ten northern tribes were genetically genocided.

This once blessed people who drew their biological lineage from Abraham was now ethnically Eliminated from the face of the earth bearing the full shame of the covenant divorce that was issued to her for covenant Infidelity, that's the covenant curse.

It was poured out in 722 by God who used Assyria as his hammer. Section 2 the southern kingdom. Now Judah the southern kingdom, which was Judah and Benjamin observed the fate of her sister from the next nation over and should have been left trembling with fear and Repenting to God so that the same thing did not happen to her.

But instead of repenting she went down the same path of wickedness. She doubled down her rebellion like her older sister Israel had done before but her crimes Did not go unnoticed. The prophets called her out with graphic and shocking imagery.

Depicting her sins in terms that that deeply offend our modern sensibility and parents. By the way, this is the section 16. Ezekiel 16 records one of the most Devastating and grotesque indictments against Judah that's recorded in the Bible.

In this passage God metaphorically recounts how he adorned her with beauty he lavished her with gold and jewels and silver and Elevated to her elevated her to a place of absolute royalty. Ezekiel 16 for 10 through 14.

Yet Passage describes that she took the gifts of God and she prostituted herself with them in the most inexcusable ways. Ezekiel 16 15 through 19. God even says in this of course is metaphorical. This is not actual.

This is metaphor, but God says this that Judah took the gold and silver that God made and she Melted it down and she Fashioned it in the shape of a penis like God and then she violated herself with it shamelessly.

That's what God said about Judah showing that she demonstrated a level of sadistic demonic depravity that was horrifying. Ezekiel 16 17. God accuses her of lusting after foreign peoples and their gods.

Because God says they were hung like mules and horses. That's Ezekiel 23 20 saying that they have biological parts Anatomy that's as big as horses, which was a symbol of her carnality and her lewdness and her spiritual harlotries.

Ezekiel 16 17 through 25. Now I get That these words and phrases are shocking and I also get that you're probably not gonna hear a sermon on Sunday about these passages but they are part of the revelation that God gave to us and the reason that they're so shocking is to show us how shocking it was that Judah who was in covenant with God was playing the whore and Betraying a pure love for Yahweh with the fertility cults of the ancient nations such as Baal and Asherah the language is intentionally provocative as if to say that Judah used the blessings that God gave her to create objects for her own spiritual self-destruction as the title of this section.

Suggest she was provoking God. She was like a child walking up to a bear a sleeping grizzly bear Slapping it in the face and thinking that it was not gonna wake up. She was begging for God to put her under the curse and her depravity deepens Throughout the prophets.

She builds shrines on every hill under every green tree. She transforms these places into brothels of false worship. Jeremiah 220. Ezekiel doesn't mince words either. He describes Judah as spreading her legs open to every passing nation and every idol seeking alliances and pleasure in her idolatry that that she's Desecrating the covenant between her and God with these mood licentious acts.

Ezekiel 16 25. Ezekiel even tells us that that she wasn't acting in desperation. She wasn't acting like a woman who who was who was Bereaved that her husband wasn't giving her any affection. No, she was acting as a whore Who had an insatiable lust for sin and an open rebellion against her husband God who had been faithful to her all-along.

Ezekiel even tells us that the surrounding pagan nations were so disgusted By her that they were taken to the point of vomit. Ezekiel 16 27, and it's important to remember That it was these nations who invented the demonic sex religions.

They were the ones who were horrified at the zenith of her depravity and it gets even worse at the apex of Judah's Downfall she was sacrificing the fruit of her own womb her children God's children on the altar of her demonic lovers.

Ezekiel's words seeth with a righteous kind of anger when he cries out You Judah have slaughtered my children and you have offered them up to idols by making them pass through the fire. Ezekiel 16 21.

The grotesque act of child sacrifice was born out of a frenzied devotion to demons. Revealed the depths of Judah's spiritual adultery. She had gone to the point to where you can barely understand how God was gracious to her.

To say that God had every reason to destroy her would have been an understatement of understatements. The behavior that we're seeing was not met by an imminent well-aimed meteorite from Yahweh, even though she deserved it God kept loving her patiently and faithfully even as she continued in her.

I'd in her adultery's Prophet after prophet was sent to her by God men like Isaiah Jeremiah Ezekiel Daniel the twelve minor prophets and countless unnamed heralds who were sent thundering God's case against her.

But she remained on moved and Here's something critical that you need to understand. The prophets were not just fiery street preachers or moody messengers. They were God's covenant lawyers. They were his divine Prosecutors and attorneys they were bringing the case against Judah.

They were suing her Based off the terms of the covenant of Moses and showing her where she was breaking covenant. They are basically coming to her with a lawsuit and saying if you don't make this, right?

Then the terms and the conditions of curses are going to be poured out on you like courtroom heralds they laid out the damning case and they pointed directly at the covenant terms that their ancestors had Solemnly sworn to upheld and they didn't mince any words.

About the consequences of Israel's rebellion and yet Judah like her wayward sister Israel Hardened her heart. She plugged her ears and she turned from the prophets warning with contempt. She silenced them with swords.

She sent them away in chains and those prophets that survived were left to weep bitterly over her hatred of God. Isaiah mourns with piercing clarity when he says how the faithful city has become a harlot.