Keep sharing good news without ads.
No description available
So let's read the Word of God together, Malachi, and I will read the first chapter, Malachi chapter 1. The Word of the Lord to Israel by Malachi. I have loved you, says the Lord, yet you say, in what way have you loved us?
Was not Esau Jacob's brother, says the Lord? Yet Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated, and laid waste his mountains and his heritage for the jackals of the wilderness. And even though Edom has said, We have been impoverished, but we will return and build the desolate places.
Thus saith the Lord of hosts, They may build, but I will throw down, and they shall be called the territory of wickedness, and the people against whom the Lord will have indignation forever. Your eyes shall see, and you shall say, The Lord is magnified beyond the border of Israel.
A son honors his father, and a servant his master, if then I am the father, where is my honor? If I am a master, where is my reverence, says the Lord of hosts? To you priests who despise my name, yet you say, In what way have we despised your name?
You often defile food on my altar, but you say, In what way have we defiled you? By saying the table of the Lord is contemptible, and when you offer the blind as a sacrifice, is it not evil? And when you offer the lame and the sick, is it not evil?
Offer then to your governor, would he be pleased with you? Would he accept you favorably, says the Lord of hosts? But now entreat God's favor, that he may be gracious to us, while this is being done by your hands, will he accept you favorably, says the Lord of hosts?
Who is there even among you who would shut the doors, so that you would not kindle fire on my altar in vain? I have no pleasure in you, says the Lord of hosts, nor will I accept an offering from your hands.
From the rising of the sun, even to its going down, my name shall be great among the Gentiles. In every place, incense shall be offered to my name, and a pure offering for my name shall be great among the nations, says the Lord of hosts.
But you have profaned it, in that you say the table of the Lord is defiled, and its fruit, its food, is contemptible. And you also say, oh, what a weariness, and you sneer at it, says the Lord of hosts, and you bring the stolen, and the lame, and the sick, and thus you bring an offering.
Should I accept this from your hands, says the Lord? But cursed be the deceiver who has a flock, in his flock a male, and makes a vow, but sacrifices to the Lord what is blemished, for I am a great king, says the Lord of hosts, and my name is to be feared among the nations.
May God bless his word, and again, before we go to his word, let us just ask God's blessing. Our Father in God, now we come to that point in our worship to consider your word. I know, God, your word is forever settled in the heavens.
Your word is unchangeable, because you are unchangeable. And so we pray, Lord, this morning, that as we come, and as your word is spoken, Lord, that you would be pleased, Holy Spirit, to do a great work.
That you would take frail creatures like us, and pour into us your great truth. That you would help me, Lord, to speak the truth. That you would help me to speak it clearly, and that you would bless, Lord Jesus.
That you would come down from on high, and open our hearts that we might love you according to your word. So be with us now, and may even this enable us to grow in the grace and the knowledge of the Son of God, who so loved us, that he gave himself for us.
Amen. Do you remember the opening that Brother Mike read? He read of the account in John chapter 4 of the Lord Jesus Christ, as he traveled through Samaria, and he met a woman, and he held a conversation with her, and in that conversation and discussion, he told her that the day was coming, and now is, when those who worship God will worship God in spirit and in truth.
And my friends, that's today. That is the reason why I asked Brother Mike to read that in the opening, is I want to speak this morning about worship. If you have a bulletin, it was titled, False Worship.
But I want to address this this morning as, in whatever state you're in, my friends, whether you're here as a child of God, or you're here as an unbeliever, in all of that, God is to be worshipped, regardless of your state.
That's right. And so I asked us to think about this, but let me begin this way. God, the true God, has no needs, friends. God would be infinitely complete if He had never created a single being. That's right.
That includes angels, principalities, powers, in whatever way we can understand it. God is infinitely complete. Has no needs. And yet, and yet, God desires that you and I, His creatures, would worship Him.
That you and I would add to His manifested glory. And the reason it's manifested is because God, in His essential glory, is not increased or decreased. God is absolute in totality at all times, eternity past, present, future.
God is in need of none. God is unique. And yet, God desires to manifest His glory in the worship of His creatures, particularly as we see it drawn out in this first chapter of Malachi. And so I ask you to think about this this morning, and I want to address it from, hopefully, the angle of your heart.
I want to address worship this morning, whether it be true worship or false worship. Not just the worship that is seen by men. Rather, the worship that proceeds from the heart and is offered to God. As you read this first chapter in Malachi, even just reading it once, if you have not read it before, or if you have not read it in a while, there's an issue, isn't there?
There's an issue, and the issue is God has an issue with the priests and those who are offering to Him sacrifices in the realm of worship. God takes issue with their form and their manner of worship. Not only the manner of their own worship, but the example that they are setting for others in the way in which they seek to offer sacrifices and worship God.
What's amazing is, I read through this, and I want to stay focused on worship, but what's amazing to me is God has an issue with the priests and the worshipers in that day of how they offered sacrifices and how they would worship Him.
And amazingly, it seems as if the priests have an issue with God. If you read through it, you could see it. God says something, and they say, wait a minute, they have an issue with the Lord God themselves.
That God should be satisfied with the form of worship that they are offering. Imagine that. God's creatures having an issue with the Creator. As we consider worship this morning, I want to ask you a question a number of times this morning.
And let me start by saying it. Why are you here today? Why are you here today, folks? Every one of you, each one of you, why are you here today? Let me address the kids. Kids, why are you here today? Is it because you had no choice?
Is it because you were forced to come? If you had your choice, would you have stayed home? Did you come here to worship God this morning? Or did you come because if you didn't come, you would have got in trouble?
Let me ask the older folks today. You figure out who's old. Why are you here today? Are you here because it's the thing you always do on Sunday? Are you here today because it's a habit? It's because of the way I was brought up?
It's because I want other people to know I went to church today. It's because of this and because of that. What I'm asking us to think about in the form of worship, and by the form of the question, why are you here today?
You come here in worship to worship God. That's a pretty straightforward question. And God demands a straightforward answer. Are you here today because you desire to praise Him? Are you here today because you desire to please Him?
Are you here today because Christ is the Savior of sinners? You see, why we are here today is a very important question to answer. You see, because this person, this Son of God, this Lord Jesus Christ, this one who's pictured in the sacrifices of the Old Testament, this one, this Jesus of the Bible, this living Son of God, He is worthy of worship.
He is worthy and none other is. He alone is worthy. And so I ask you that question that you and I might examine our motives. That you and I would, if you will, plow up our hearts a bit. That you and I would be honest.
You see, because the truth is you can't fool God anyway. God knows why we're here today. Every one of us. He knows if we came to worship Him or if we came because we were coerced, forced, it was profitable, it was this, it was that, it was the other thing.
And I want to show you from this first chapter of Malachi and then one other short section in the book of Isaiah what God thought of their worship. To help us to answer that question, why am I here today?
Am I here to worship the living and true God? The reason why God is dissatisfied with their worship is answered in this chapter, I believe, in several different ways. Look at verse 6 of chapter 1. A son honors his father.
A servant his master. If then I am the father, where is my honor? If I am a master, where is my reverence? Says the Lord of hosts to you priests who despise my name. One of the reasons why God alone is worthy of our worship, one of the reasons why we have to examine our own hearts and do we truly worship God out of a debt of gratitude, out of a debt of Him being alone, the High and Lifted One, is because He is the Creator.
If I am a father, where is my honor? If I am a master, where is my reverence? Says the Lord. Friends, just to remind us over and over again, we were not brought here by some evolutionary process. We are not here because, as I have heard, some cosmic alignment of the moon and the stars and lights and all these other things.
That's not why we are here this morning. And guess what? We are not here because some alien race decided to seed the earth with us as an experiment. How silly, how ridiculous. But here's the truth. Why are we here today?
Are we here to worship God? Because He has made us! The One who created out of nothing. The One who gives life and breath and being to all. You know why worship is so important? Heart worship. Real worship.
True worship. Worship in the Spirit. It's because the God of the Bible is not some two-bit God of men's imaginations, friends. He's not just a myth. He's not a fable. He's not the result of what men have conjured up over time.
Listen, my friends, whether you believe it or not, He is the Lord of Glory. This Jesus is the Lord of Glory, my friends. He's not just some religious leader. He's not just some figurehead to look to. He's the Son of God!
You think it's important that our worship is true? To this One who lives, who knows our very being because He created us. I so love that Psalm that says, Shall not He who created the eye see? Shall not the One who created the ear hear?
Did we come here to play some game with God? Did we come here because in love He's given us new hearts, new minds, and a new desire! We want to be here! We want to worship Him. We want to praise Him. We want to adore Him.
We want to, in gratitude, be thankful to Him because He created us. There's a second reason why God has a contention with the worship that takes place in this first chapter, and it's in verse 14. This is why it's so important to ask the question of why you're here today, and again, it's because God is worthy.
And you might say, you keep saying the same thing. Well, friends, because it's true! You want to make something up? The truth is God is worthy. Look at verse 14. But cursed be the deceiver who has in his flock a male and makes a vow but sacrifices to the Lord what is blemished.
For I am a great king says the Lord of Hosts and my name is to be feared among the nations. The reason why worship is so important is because God is the great.
King. In the Psalms it says God is great and His greatness.
And greatly to be praised and His greatness is unsearchable. Again, it's not some God that was cut out of wood or stone or some way in which men began to think. My friends, listen to the psalm. It says praise the Lord, praise God in His sanctuary.
Praise Him in His mighty firmament. Praise Him for His mighty acts. Praise Him according to His excellent greatness. Praise Him with the sound of the trumpet. Praise Him with the lute and the harp. Praise Him with the timbrel and dance.
Praise Him with string instruments and flutes. Praise Him with loud cymbals. Praise Him with clashing cymbals. You know how the book of Psalms ends?
Let everything that has breath praise the Lord. He alone.
He is alone worthy and here's the reality behind that. Not only is God worthy of our worship, but God is the one who dictates the way in which He will be worshipped. Because He's the great king He holds accountable those that He calls.
To worship Him. There's.
So many deceptions in the heart of men, but I'm going to give you things that have always struck me and just summarize them in two two quick things. One of the reasons why men will worship God is because they don't believe that God sees them.
They can live their life whether it be outwardly or inwardly. They can think whatever thoughts they want. They can act whatever way they want and God doesn't see them. Maybe God's too busy. Maybe God's off creating another universe somewhere, another galaxy.
Men don't believe that God sees them and you want to know the second? Because they don't believe that God can see them they don't believe God can do anything about it. So if they offer God false worship God can't do anything about it.
Well I'm here to tell you this God the God of the Bible is great!
And He can and He will hold men accountable. I've been told I'm too serious about Christ. I don't care.
This is the truth is it not? He's a great king. And so when God says that to them that He is to be feared among the nations I ask us to ask ourselves and you kids, again I'm not forgetting you do you love God?
Will you worship God? And you teenagers, oh you're getting old now do you worship the true God? Or are you just here today for the ride? Or maybe you're going to get some dinner? Or maybe it'll just go better for you?
Are you here to worship the Lord this morning? Are you here to worship the Savior of sinners? And there's a third reason in this chapter why God contends with their manner of worship both outwardly and inwardly.
And it's in verse 2. Just look at verse 2 quickly. God says this I have loved you says the Lord yet you say in what way have you loved us? The answer is was not Esau Jacob's brother says the Lord yet Jacob I have loved but Esau I have hated and laid waste the mountains and his heritage for the jackals of the wilderness.
One of the reasons why worship is so important and why worship needs to be from the heart.
Is because of the greatness and the goodness of God. In context.
He's addressing the children of Israel through the priests that are offering the sacrifices. And I want to ask you I don't care where you are today. I don't care if you're young or old and in that sense it doesn't matter whether you're a believer or an unbeliever right now oh it does matter.
But let me make this. God is worthy of worship.
Because he's so good. If you are.
A child of God this morning, God is worthy because God.
Has so loved you, rescued you, he saved you.
He didn't just make you he redeemed you, he bought.
You on the cross that you and I would have life, abundant life.
Real life, true life. The reason why worship is so important and it is important to God is because God spared not his own son to gather us to him that we might worship him. God because he's bought us back from the slave market.
Of sin. He said you are mine and he'll never leave us nor forsake us.
What about any God we serve? He's loved us. So if you're a child of God this morning, you ought to worship him in thanksgiving and gratefulness. It ought to break our hearts. The problem with us is our hearts so often are cold get caught up in everything else.
Let me address you this morning if you're not a believer. If you're not a true child of God, one of the reasons why worship of God is so essential and so important is because God has been so good to you.
You could sit here this morning and not be a child of God. And God has been so good to you. And if you're here today and you're not a believer you ought to get down on your knees and praise God and cut you off.
Oh how we live in a day when worship is nothing more than just a hand clap or a praise the Lord. And you're not a child of God. You've been breathing God's air you've been eating God's food.
You've been enjoying the warmth of God's sun and maybe we're not enjoying the heat index. He's allowed.
You to be here this morning because here's the truth if you die today.
Without Christ, your quote this week.
It said that heaven was not a place for men to be prepared but heaven was a place to receive those that were already.
Prepared. So if you're here.
This morning and you don't have a new heart and you're not a child of God.
And your worship is dead, I'm here to tell you.
God is worthy because he's been so good.
To you. God owes us, wow you.
Make God sound so far off how could you say that? God owes us nothing we owe God everything.
And God is worthy. You see this.
Question of why we're here today I hope.
Grows larger and larger. There's a.
Second point I want to make and it's not only that the reason why worship is so essential and that's particularly how offensive false worship is as I show you as we close but the reason why worship is so essential and it's got to be worship in spirit of truth it's got to be the worship that God has established not the worship that we have established for God.
That was the issue. God says bring me this sacrifice and they brought God that sacrifice and then they said to God you should be satisfied just like some people might be thinking right now. Why am I here today?
Why are you asking such a question? I'm here right?
Get on with it. I'm here. There's a second.
Issue and the issue is this not only was God did God have issues with their hearts as concerning what they were bringing but he also had an issue with the quality of the sacrifice. In other words God's not interested solely in quantity.
I've heard people say well if I go to church a hundred times a week I go to church a hundred times a week. What if you were a devil and you sat in church a hundred times a week would that be worthy worship?
No! God is interested in the quality of it. He wants it to be from our hearts and notice the issue here with the quality of the sacrifice. Look in verse 6 through 8 again staying in this chapter but just the quality of the worship that they were offering and God's response to it.
Look at it. A son honors his father a servant his master. If then I am the father where is my honor. If I am a master where is my reverence says the Lord opposed to you priests who despise my name and yet you say in what way have we despised your name.
You offer defiled food on my altar. But you say in what way have we defiled you. By saying the temple. The table of the Lord is contemptible. And when you offer the blind as a sacrifice is it not evil.
When you offer the lame and the sick is it not evil. Offer them to your governor. Would he be pleased with you. Would he accept you favorably says the Lord. What have they done. I'll tell you what they've done.
They've offered the Lord seconds and they've kept back for themselves the first you know God is not hungry for meat. I just want to clear that God is not just someone who desires nothing else but barbecue.
God is forever completely satisfied within himself. God doesn't need a protein bar. God doesn't need an energy drink. God's not like us. And so when they offer these sacrifices it's the point of worship.
It's their whole attitude towards worship. See what they offer. They offer the lame, the sick the blind, the halt. Interesting how it's turned around and how he poses that question to them and he says offer it then to your governor.
See what he thinks of it. You know I kept thinking I'm so fleshy, I know you guys are all so spiritual but I'm fleshy. I was thinking and I thought of it this way. God doesn't like rewraps. You like rewraps?
I don't. I don't want to receive a gift that somebody, they didn't want. So they gave it to me. Keep it for yourself. I don't want that anybody thrilled over it? I might be thrilled over leftovers. I'll eat leftovers every day of the week.
But folks God doesn't desire rewraps. Consider it from the cross. God didn't have to create us. God desired to create us. We sin against God. That's right. We deserve punishment. We deserve to be separated from God for he is holy and we are not what a predicament.
God provides a sacrifice a propitiation an appeasement, an atonement a way for us to come out from under the judgment of God and back into a right state with him that we might enjoy him and praise him forever.
What does God do? Does God offer the lame or the sick? Except the son of Islam. This is my beloved son in whom I am well pleased. Did God spare anything? God didn't just send a man friends. He didn't just send a good man, he didn't send an angel.
He didn't send a legion of angels. He sent his son the eternal son to die on Golgotha's cross that you and I would know him and worship him. God spared nothing. And yet they're going to offer God the lame and the sick and the halt whatever comes into their mind.
And that's something the way people are today too. People say to God I'll worship you the way I feel I will worship you. And you should be satisfied with that God. If I decide that I'm going to worship you in this way then you should be content that I at least worship you.
NO! We ought to offer God. Who did we come to worship? Who do you worship when you're in your own closet friends? Who do you praise? Is it the God in your own imagination? Or is it the living true God?
Who do you fall down before? The savior of sinners? Or the savior that you created? And I suppose that would be all fine. And well if there wasn't a true and living God. But there is. If you could just create your own God then might as well just live like the apostle Paul as he drink and be married.
For tomorrow we die. We'll carry our God upon our shoulders. He could be a genie in a bottle. He'll come when I call. And when I don't need him I stick him back in the bottle. I put the cork on and I tell him to be quiet until I need him again.
Oh that's I think that's pretty good example of what many people do when they need God. They call upon God when they don't need God. God go over there. Yeah. Let's ask you to think about this brothers and sisters even as we who's the God of America?
Oh that's what we talk about in so many different ways. God will accept this. And God will accept that. It doesn't matter what you are or who you are or how you live. It don't matter who you marry or who you don't marry.
It don't matter if you abort babies or you don't abort babies. None of that matters. It's just God. It's lame worship. It's sick worship, it's halted worship again. I say to so many of us worship is nothing more than well we sing a few songs and you know.
And if we really move we'll even say an amen. That's right. Remember the Lord Jesus how he despised the worship of the Pharisees. He said to them you draw near to me with your lips. But your hearts are what?
Far from me. He said in vain. Do you worship me teaching for commandments the doctrines of men. If you remember Matthew 23 where Jesus pronounces those woes on the religious class. Those that thought that they were the best.
Those that thought that they had it all together. Those that thought that everyone ought to look to them for worship. You remember the Pharisees? They would walk through the streets and they would blow the trumpet.
And they would say Pharisee Joe. I don't know everybody. Joe. I even call my daughter-in-law Joe. Pharisee Joe would blow the trumpet and he'd say gather around. I'm about to pray. You remember in Matthew 23 what Jesus said.
He said you make the outside of the cup clean. But inside it is nothing but uncleanness. You make the outside of the graves the sepulchres clean and you whitewash them. And inside they're full of dead men's bones.
You see God's not necessarily only concerned with the quantity. He's concerned with the quality was not the widow who cast into two mites so much greater justified by the Savior than the Pharisees. And what did they do?
Remember they gave out of their abundance.
She gave out of her poverty had a lot to do with quality.
Listen if God just merely wants us out with worship God can create God. It says the stones cry out for goodness sake. It says the trees clap their hands at God. It says this whole creation praises the Lord.
I have no doubts that when the birds are flying in the air and they're making all those weird noises that they're praising God or when the whales communicate or all I believe everything in some way lets praise God.
And I'm not talking about in a pantheistic kind of way. But God has created us that we would our minds and our hearts would rational think and realize where we were what he's done how he's brought us out of darkness into his mother's life and that we would adore him.
You know they had an issue with God. And they kept saying if you read it they kept saying God says yet you say in what way have we despised you in verse 7. In what way have we defiled you. And it goes on and on.
If you read the whole book of Malachi it just goes back and forth. Right. It goes back and forth. The prophet is speaking for God. The people have their side of it if you will. And God takes them and takes their reasoning and whittles it down to nothing.
They considered if you will that the worship of God was something to be despised. It was a weariness to them. They even say it. They even come to that point where they say it is a weariness to them. Look at it.
There it is in verse 12. But you profane it in that you say the table of the Lord is defiled and its fruit and its food is contemptible. And you also say oh what a weariness. Oh what a weariness. And you sneer it says the Lord of hosts.
And you bring the stolen and the lame and the sick. And thus you bring an offering. Should I accept this from your hands says the Lord. You want to know why so many don't worship in spirit of truth. Let me tell you why.
You can tell me. I'm not telling you the truth but the word of God tells the truth. Doesn't it. You want to know why so many don't worship the Lord. Because they find no pleasure in the Lord. That's right.
That's exactly the truth. They don't love God. I'll tell you a thousand times they love God. And they believe in God. And listen. If you love someone you will be with them. You will seek to please them.
You will seek to honor them to them. This whole thing was a burden. This whole thing to them was more of a burden and a chore than an act of worship. Was it a chore for you to come here this morning. Was it something that you really didn't want.
When are you going to end this. Don't you ever run out of breath. And I assure you I will run out of breath. But here's the reality. And I trust and I hope that this is our desire. As long as we have breath we'll praise the Lord.
How's that. We'll give him our hearts. It won't be out of compulsion. It will be out of desire. You know what. Friends it's not just an Old Testament truth. It's a New Testament truth. You're not going to get out of it by saying well you know God is love in the New Testament.
God was a God of war a God of blood in the Old Testament. Listen. God doesn't change. The angels were worshiping God. If they were created before us. They were worshiping God long before we were here.
And you if you're a child of God get ready. Because you have an eternity to worship him. Amen. I'm going to worship the Lord. That's what it says in Isaiah 2. It says get out of my way. Let's go up to the mountain of the Lord.
Let's worship. Oh worship the King. You saints of the Lord. He's worthy. We need to really examine ourselves. You see. That's why that question to the Samaritan. That discussion with the Samaritan woman was so essential.
She thought well we worship in this mountain. Or maybe we worship in that mountain. And the Pharisees they thought well we worship this way. And we follow this one. We follow Rabbi so-and-so. And you follow Rabbi so-and-so.
And maybe I'm a Sadducee and maybe I'm a scribe. And maybe I'm a Herodian. And maybe I'm many. And there are how many people even in our own land this morning that are offering God worship. But is it true worship.
Is it from a redeemed heart. Is it from a debt of gratitude. Is it because he is worthy. Listen my friends don't worship God. And try to bargain with God. God I'll do this. If you do that. Be careful.
Be careful trying to bargain with your way to heaven. Be careful trying to bargain with God. God I'll give you my worship. But first you got to do this this this this for me. Listen. God does what God pleases to do.
And if you can't live with that you'll die. It's as simple as that. You can't argue with me because this is not my word. It's his word. I'm hiding behind the cross. I ask you to turn to one other section before we close.
Why are you here today. Go to Isaiah the very first chapter. The book of Isaiah chapter 1. And we'll close in this section Isaiah chapter 1. And again I'm going to read a longer portion because I want you to see it.
I want you to see it in its context. Isaiah chapter 1. The vision of Isaiah the son of Amoz which he saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem in the days of Uzziah Jotham Ahaz and Hezekiah kings of Judah. Hear O heavens and give ear O earth.
For the Lord has spoken. I have nourished and brought up children and they have rebelled against me. The ox knows its owner. The donkey is master's crib. But Israel does not know my people. Do not consider alas sinful nation a people laden with iniquity.
A brood of evil doers. Children who are corrupt as they have forsaken the Lord. They have provoked to anger the Holy One of Israel. They have turned away backwards. Now watch what it says. Why should you be stricken again.
You will revolt more and more. The whole head is sick. The whole heart faints from the sole of your foot even to the head. There is no soundness in it but wounds and bruises and putrefying sores. They have not been closed or bound up or soothed with ointment.
Your country is desolate. Your cities are burned with fire. Strangers devour your land and your presence. And it is desolate as overthrown by strangers. And the daughter of Zion is left as a booth in a vineyard as a hut in a garden of cucumbers as a besieged city.
Unless the Lord of hosts had left us a very small remnant we would have become like Sodom would have been made like Gomorrah. Hear the word of the Lord. You rulers of Sodom give ear to the law of our God.
You people of Gomorrah. To what purpose is the multitude of your sacrifices to me says the Lord. I've had enough of burnt offerings of rams and the fat of fed cattle. I don't delight in the blood of bulls or lambs or goats.
When you come to appear before me. Who has required this from your hand to trample my courts. Bring me no more futile sacrifices incenses and abomination to me. The new moons, the sabbaths the calling of the assemblies.
I cannot endure iniquity in the sacred meeting. The new moons. Your appointed feasts my soul hates. They are a trouble to me. I am weary of bearing them. When you spread out your hands I will hide my eyes from you.
Even though you make many prayers. I will not hear. Your hands are full of blood. Wash yourselves, make yourselves clean. Put away the evil of your doing from before my eyes. Cease to do evil, learn to do good.
Seek justice. Reprove the oppressors. Defend the fatherless, plead for the widow. Come now, let us reason together says the Lord, though your sins are like scarlet they shall be white as snow. Though they are red like crimson they shall be as wool.
If you are willing and obedient you shall eat the good of the land. But if you refuse and rebel you shall be devoured by the Lord from the mouth of the Lord. I have spoken. That ought to take our breath away.
That ought to stop a man dead in his tracks. That ought to cause us to really examine why we worship. Many people say, well it doesn't matter what name your God is, as long as we worship God we're all good.
Isn't that a sin? God is jealous. He has a holy jealousy for his name. God's name will not be run through the mud my friends. God desires that we offer him. Not the lame in the halt. Not the rewraps. Not what's left over spared.
Not his own son. We ought not to spare it all in worship. In gratitude. We could never repay the debt. He, Jesus. He paid a debt. He paid a debt. He did not owe. He was sinless. He always did the things that pleased the father.
He never offered God.
Tainted worship he even had to cross.
Lord if it be possible that this cup would pass if not Lord let your will be done and not mine. He didn't even open his mouth at the false accusations. And when they dragged him till they got this cross and when they nailed him he never said a word other than Father.
I commend my spirit to you. And by the way friends don't feel sorry for Jesus. He's on the throne he's high he's exalted. And one day he's going to gather at his feet all the true worshipers of God. Brothers and sisters we're not going to need the screens and we ain't going to need all these fancy machines and everything else.
Praise will be so loud it will shatter heaven. We see here what they do. God says I hate it friends do you and I. God hates things and it's a holy hatred. God says he hates the workers of iniquity. How could you say that God is love.
Yes my friends God is holy love. God hates all the workers of iniquity. And God hates false worship. Friends wash yourselves. Make yourselves clean. Put away the evil from doing before you. I cease to do evil.
Learn to do good. Seek justice. Reprove the oppressive. Defend the fathers. Plead the widow. Come now. How could God be so gracious. How could he be so kind to those who have offered him nothing but false worship.
How could he be so gracious that he invites. He desires that we would come and receive forgiveness. He wants to make us whole and all we've given him is what we felt. We should give him and he should be happy.
And yet for all of that.
God says and you know what's the hardest thing for people to do.
It's to come it's to receive freely. We'd rather offer something. God you paid most of it but I got a couple bucks. Let me throw something in there. Jesus paid it all all to him. I owe sin. Had left a what a crimson stain.
He washed it white as snow. I don't care why you're here this morning. I do care how you leave here from my friends. Don't go out with false worship. You shall be white as snow though your sins are like crimson they shall be as wool.
If you're willing and obedient you shall eat the good of the lamb. But if you refuse and rebel you shall be devoured by the sword. For the mouth of the Lord has spoken millions of people in hell today for millions more to come tomorrow.
Jesus said come unto me all you that are heavy laden take my yoke upon you. Learn of me for my yoke is easy and my burden is light and you will find rest for your souls. Brothers and sisters let us heed the.
The warnings the exhortations the encouragements of the Lord let us come and worship. Let us give God our very best. And our very best is.
To acknowledge and not just.
Acknowledge him to worship him in the beauty of holiness.
I pray my friends that God will help us that God will help us to offer ourselves as a living sacrifice. And let me end it to you by quoting again that very last phrase in the book of Psalms. Let everything that has breath.