Jude #2 - Israel in the Wilderness — Chuck Missler

Jude and the Apostasy of the Last Days

All right, Book of Jude, interesting book, written by a brother of James, both of which we believe were brothers of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Also the word in the Greek is Judas, so when we find a name of that emotional quality heading a book, it doesn't surprise us to find that the Book of Jude can be subtitled The Acts of the Apostates, just as the Acts of the Apostles are the beginning of the Church, the Acts of the Apostates are the end of the Church.

Jude's specific, in a prophetic sense, his message is to the end of the age. I was attracted to taking the book up for two reasons. Part of it mischief, because Jude talks about, he gives us an excuse to really get in the murky, misty corners of the Old Testament.

So we'll do that, of course, won't miss that opportunity. But also because his very specific prophetic message points to our day in some very peculiar ways, and we'll be dealing with that also, in effect, as a book of prophecy.

So why are we studying the Book of Jude? Because it affects our day. Another reason we're studying the Book of Jude, it's sort of a contrast to the Book of James. James has to do with works evidencing faith, Jude speaks of works which evidence the lack of faith or apostasy, those that have fallen away.

Contending Earnestly for the Faith

We won't try to review all that we covered last time, except to just refresh your memory on the main admonition from last time, and that was to contend earnestly for the faith. Every one of you is being called to contend for the faith.

You can do that through a direct witness. You can do that by preparing for that direct witness should the opportunity come. You can do that by supporting those that are espousing the whole counsel of God.

Your pastor here, the Tate Ministries that you find constructive, the radio programs that you find really preaching in contrast to some of the things that are going on today. More of which we will talk about tonight.

Three Examples of Apostasy in Jude

Now last time, we got all the way through verse 4, so you'll find that our progress last time of four complete verses was remarkable, because we're going to use some of the coming verses as excuses to depart, not from the faith, but from the book at hand and poke around a little bit.

Verses 5, 6, and 7 are a trio that speak of three examples of apostasy. Verse 5 is about Israel. Verse 6, about the angels that sinned. That's the fun one. That's Halloween time. That's verse 6. And verse 7, Sodom and Gomorrah.

And there are three different groups. Israel, we'll consider as being saved men. Verse 6, the angels are angels. They're sort of special class. We find that there's some that blew the mission. We'll find out about that when we get to that.

And the third category are unsaved. Sodom and Gomorrah, we generally wouldn't categorize as a saved community. Tonight we're going to focus specifically on verse 5. And we have here the Holy Spirit speaking, not to students of the Old Testament per se, but to you and I.

The Holy Spirit's taking for granted that you have a command, a mastery of the Old Testament. Many of you in this room do. Some of you are yet to find it. But clearly we're going to get into that. And clearly the Holy Spirit has put that history of Israel, that very specific history here referred to, there for some very specific practical use by you and I.

That's what we're going to focus on a bit. Let's read verse 5. Jude says, I will therefore, now back up before, I guess the therefore implies that we really have fresh in our minds what just went on before.

He introduces himself, the first two verses, let's just reread 3 and 4 to catch the mood of verse 5. Verse 3, Beloved, when I gave all diligence to write unto you of the common salvation, in other words, he started to write one thing and then changed his mind.

It was needful for me, or to be more precise, I was compelled, what's sort of lost in the King James translation here, is Jude was going to sit down and just write a neat letter about our common salvation, those neat things.

But the Holy Spirit drove him, almost compelled him, almost pressured him, forced him, to focus his attention on contending for the faith. And the whole letter, we'll discover, is about apostasy and warnings of falling away from the faith.

It's written not to unbelievers, it's written to you and I, Beloved, Beloved, he says. He's presuming you're saved, that is you the reader. For there are certain men crept in unawares who were before of old, ordained to this condemnation, ungodly men, turning the grace of our God into lasciviousness and denying the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ.

So these are deniers. They're not outside the church, they're inside the church. They sneak in secretly. They're here. And one of the things that has drawn me to the book of Jude is that there is a heresy, there's a number of them, but there's a specific heresy growing within both the charismatic and fundamental believing body in America that is growing and, in my opinion, laying the foundation for the time of Jacob's trouble.

There's a very specific heresy that I believe will grow and become the fulfillment of a number of prophecies. And that's one reason we're into Jude. And we'll start on that tonight a little bit, but let's keep moving here to verse 5.

Jude continues, I will therefore, the therefore referring to this intrusion of heresy within the body, I will therefore put you in remembrance, though ye once knew this, that the Lord, having saved the people out of the land of Egypt, afterward destroyed them that believed not.

Jude's point is, hey, you guys remember Exodus, Numbers, Deuteronomy? You remember how they were delivered, miraculously, in a mind-blowing way. You know, you've seen it from passages, you've also seen it skillfully presented in film.

How this world empire ultimately yielded to these theatrics that God specifically set up when God called Moses, not in the film, in the text. He pointed out that Pharaoh would not believe. You don't catch that in the film abbreviation, obviously.

But if you read the text, one of the bizarre things, when Moses is called, the Lord predicts that he's not going to believe at first. God sets it up. If you'll excuse the expression, he's almost showing off.

He's going to use the occasion to show his strength and power, and does. And all through the Old Testament, subsequently, when God wants to put his thumb under suspenders, if he was, he makes reference how he delivered Israel out of Egypt.

It wasn't just the minimum amount of power needed to have it happen. You know, often we get the impression that God is very economic. He sort of, you know, if there's a ministry that needs money, it always comes the day before the sheriff shows up, you know.

A minute early is a minute wasted, you get the feeling sometimes. Not in Egypt. God really did some fabulous stage management there. Gave us an incredible story. Well, you all know the story. You all know the story.

Pillar of fire by night, the cloud by day, trapped between the Egyptian army and the Red Sea, and the waters actually part for them to go through. And, of course, the Egyptians drowning in their attempt to follow.

Dramatic stuff. How long a trip was it from there to Qadesh Baniyya? Eleven days, according to Deuteronomy chapter 2. Eleven day journey. How long did it take them? Thirty-eight. Actually, we say forty years.

Actually, thirty-eight years, yeah. Thirty-eight years to make an eleven day journey. Question. How many, how many people, you've all heard studies and things, how many people do you visualize leaving Egypt in that deliverance?

A million? That's a good number. There are all kinds of estimates, but that's a fair one. A bunch. How many of those over twenty entered the promised land? Two. That's what I call attrition. That's sobering, because that's what he's talking about here.

You see, in part. Million were delivered. Were those million saved? That's the question that's going to bother us as we drive home tonight. Now, admittedly, there were some mixed multitudes. Among the group was Edward G. Robinson and the bunch that sort of got versed.

You remember Korah and Dathan and Abiathan? We're going to talk about them a little later in Jude anyway, as I recall. So we don't have to, you know, hit them too hard right now. We'll get our chance at them.

But the point is, yes, there were some that really got versed, but one of the questions that will bother you, were they saved? Were they baptized unto Moses? You know, there's a whole bunch of questions here that we'll want to deal with.

And it would be very unskillful of me to spoon-feed you too much. It's only fair, as a coach of a graduate group like you, to leave some of these more salient points to be discovered by the student at his leisure, you see.

So I'll lead you part of the way and let you chew on the rest, but we'll go on. I'm going to suggest to you that these lessons that Jude is pointing out in verse 5 are very focused. For example, I don't believe Jude is focusing on the ability of the Lord to save these people.

That's not the issue here. The fact that God is able and willing to save is not the issue. He takes that for granted. Of all the other lessons that we're not going to talk about would be things like the Passover lamb, the blood on the doorposts, how were they saved out of Egypt?

By blood on the doorposts and so forth. The whole Passover issue is not at issue here. The Red Sea miracle isn't. The whole implication of that isn't the main issue here. As they wander in the wilderness, the tabernacle, the priests, the offerings, all those incredible lessons are not the issues here.

What is the issue? Apostasy, falling away, and destruction that comes upon them because of that. That's what we're going to try to focus on. The lesson that we're going to learn, I'm giving a glimpse ahead so you can sort of know where I'm headed, is that God reserves the right to destroy that people if they become guilty of certain forms of unbelief or other sins to which unbelief leads.

That's the sobering insight we're going to see, dramatized by none other than Israel herself. Now, before we charge into this too far, it's always nice to sort of equip yourself with some emergency rations because we're going to take kind of a dangerous trip here.

Assurance of Eternal Security in Christ

Before we go too far, let me give you some important relief. Let me remind you of some assurances for your safekeeping that I don't want you to lose sight of because we're going to go down a path, I want to anticipate some anxieties you may feel.

Turn with me to John 10. I don't want you to, as we go down this path, lose sight of the fact that your security is in Christ Jesus. And I love when we, there's lots of, lots of verses we could pick for this.

I want to sort of put a stake in the ground, an anchor, before we start wandering too far from our tether here. So I'd like you to turn to John chapter 10, where the Lord gives us a couple of important verses.

In verse 27, he says, My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow me. All of you that are his sheep, raise your hand, please. Okay, thank you. Right, right. Good. Good. I want you to notice what he says about the sheep.

Verse 28, and mark it if you haven't yet. Jesus speaking says,. And I give unto them eternal life, and they shall hardly ever perish. Is that what he says? No. And they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.

Do you know what I'm comforted by? Because I'm a man, and I am not able to pluck myself out of his hand. If my security rested on me alone, I would be in big trouble. They shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of my hand.

Jesus Christ speaking. I love verse 29, because he goes on in a very typical Hebrew fashion. If you're familiar with the Psalms and Proverbs and so forth, our poetry in the West is rhymes and meters. Hebrew poetry is the offset of parallel thoughts, sometimes contrasts, sometimes the same thing said two different ways.

Very typical in the Hebrew thought pattern, and we see it here. My Father who gave them to me, who gave us to Jesus Christ? The Father. My Father who gave them to me is greater than all, and no man is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand.

You know, I read that for many, many years before I realized there are two hands involved. We're not in his hand like this, we're in their hands like this. Can't get out. Okay, and there's many passages like this, just to have another one, you might turn to John 4, since it's handy, just turn to the left.

You all know the story of the woman by the well, Samaritan woman, Jesus went a long way to keep that date, it's a very famous event, but we'll just grab for our purposes tonight one verse, verse 14. Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall hardly ever thirst.

Was the word there? Never. Boy, I am fond of the word never in John 10 and John 4. But the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life. No conditions in the sense of being losable.

If you're born again, I don't know how you can become unborn, and I'm saying that not to stimulate a theological debate on eternal security. If nothing else, you can put in your notepad that Chuck Missler is one of those extremists.

Right, I happen to be, I make no apologies. And of course, as long as we're talking notepads, at the top of your pad, upper right hand corner you put Act 1711, in which Luke tells you not to believe anything, because I tell you, but to search the Scriptures daily to prove whether those things be so.

But I don't want us to confuse our eternal security with the fact that we can suffer destruction. And that's what we're going to discover happens to Israel, and what Jude is pointing out we should be aware of.

So from verse 5, I want us to get a perspective of what the salvation that they had was, what their unbelief involved, and what the destruction was. It's very important. There are three examples in these three verses, 5, 6, and 7.

The second two are tied up with eternal punishment. And so if you read this casually, you might assume that it applies to all three. I don't think it does apply to verse 5. It might apply to some in verse 5, but I don't want you to, you know, derive from this a insecurity in terms of the adequacy of Christ's completed work on the cross.

I don't want you to get that. I'm sorry, I don't want you to overreact to what we're getting into. First question then, were the people, was Israel truly saved? My premise is absolutely. Absolutely. That's what the blood in the doorpost was all about.

And I could go through lots of verses to establish this. In Exodus chapter 3, verse 7, God speaks of them as my people. Exodus 3, 7, 5, 1, Deuteronomy 33, 29, and on and on and on, all the way through that whole episode.

God lays claim and ownership on Israel. Everyone knew. Sure, there's some that we're going to discover had some very peculiar views. There were some that prayed an unusual prayer, and God answered it.

We'll talk about that in a minute. I'm going to suggest that they were saved in a deeper sense than just being delivered from the bondage of Egypt. Now, I'd like to make an interesting point. We visualize a million people leaving Egypt, crossing the Red Sea on dry land, right?

Right? How many of those ended up back in Egypt? None, that's right. Interesting footnote, I call your attention. There are lessons to be learned, but they didn't go back into Egypt, for whatever obscure insight that might give you.

Now, among the multitude, there were some that didn't make it, in terms of God's intention for them, in terms of their whole program, and we're going to focus on them a bit. Let's turn, if you will, we're going to have a lesson on answered prayer, turn to Numbers 14.

We'll be spending some time in Numbers, several places, but let's just start here with Numbers chapter 14. The scene is when the spies, these twelve guys, were selected to go and do some reconnaissance.

They come back, and ten of them are really nervous and frightened. They speak of the giants in the land. We'll talk more about that when we get to another subject, but anyway, two of them, Joshua and Caleb, say, hey, come on guys, let's go.

God's on our side, who can be against us, that sort of thing. Chapter 14, verse 1, and all the congregation lifted up their voice and cried, and the people wept that night. And all the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron.

And the whole congregation said unto them, would God that we had died in the land of Egypt, or would God that we had died in this wilderness, would you say they're ungrateful? It wasn't so long ago that they were feeling the sting of the taskmaster's whips.

It wasn't that long ago they were abused slaves. God through the most incredible theatrics delivers them. And how quickly they forget. And now they're murmuring, and they're saying, oh, would God that we had died in the wilderness.

They go on, verse 3, and wherefore hath the Lord brought us into this land to fall by the sword, that our wives and our children should be a prey? Were it not better for us to return to Egypt? And so on, right?

Let's find out how the Lord deals with this. We'll skip on down here to verse 26 of the same chapter. The Lord spake again unto Moses and Aaron, saying, How long shall I bear with this evil congregation, who murmur against me?

I have heard the murmurings of the children of Israel, which they murmur against me. Saying unto them, As truly as I live, saith the Lord, as ye have spoken in my ears, so will I do to you. Your carcasses shall fall in this wilderness.

And all who were numbered of you, according to your whole number, from twenty years old and upward, who have murmured against me, doubtless ye shall not come into the land concerning which I swore to make you dwell therein, except Caleb the son of Jephunneh and Joshua the son of Nun.

But your little ones whom ye said would be a prey, or should be a prey, them will I bring in, and they shall know the land which ye have despised. Heavy trip. For thirty-eight years they wander, till I die off.

They got their prayer answered. The famous, famous wilderness wanderings. Verse thirty-four. But as for you, your carcasses shall fall in this wilderness, and your children shall wander in the wilderness forty years, and bear your harlot trees, until your carcasses be wasted in the wilderness, and so forth.

Heavy trip. Very heavy trip. Now, there's a tendency for you and I to read these quaint stories in the Torah, in the Pentateuch, in the five books of Moses, and regard that as, well, they were under the law, that was them, we're under grace, right?

And indeed we are, don't misunderstand me. Lest you think I'm on some kind of side trip, I'm going to turn to one of my favorite commentators. One of my favorite commentators in Scripture is a guy by the name of Paul, okay?

And turn with me to his first letter to the Corinthian church, and he has set aside a chapter on this for us. Chapter ten. First Corinthians, chapter ten, and we're going to be interested in about the first fourteen verses, but before we get into that, I'd like to start with verse eleven.

We're going to peek into the middle of this to get a very important insight. Chapter ten, you'll discover, talks about Israel in the wilderness, from verses one on, but before we get into that, notice verse eleven.

Paul tells us, now all these things happened unto them, why? For examples. Examples. And they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the ages are come. You and I, sitting in this room, are the ones that the Holy Spirit has written numbers fourteen and others, and sixteen and twenty-one and twenty-five, and others, for you and I, not just of Israel, and not just for us to look back and say, gee, those poor people, they were under the law, and my goodness, why couldn't they understand, you know?

It's amazing how many people see, you know, the movie The Ten Commandments, Unsaved, they see the movie, and one of the things that I've heard highlighted to me was, they can't understand the end of the movie, how these people, having seen all that first hand, could then fall away, you know?

Well, A, they did, and B, look at us. We have much more than they, and do we fall away? We must. That's why Judah's writing to us, that's why Paul was writing to the Corinthian church, and so that's where we're headed.

Israel in the Wilderness as a New Testament Warning

I'm going to suggest to you a basic principle of the scripture, and that is that nothing's extraneous. I don't believe that there's a name, a number, a place in the scripture that's not there for our learning.

Admittedly, a lot of it is perhaps in the byways and the side trips, but the central themes are clearly for our learning. I think I've shared with you what some of the Kabbalistic rabbis believe. They say that when the Messiah comes, he will interpret all things.

He will even interpret the spaces between the letters. That's how they, and they're serious, that's how they believe that the text is so mystical, the numerical value of the letters, and every detail has meaning, and they muster up some amazing insights from all that.

I really, I lean that way. I'm perhaps a New Testament Kabbalist, I suppose. I really, I think they're on the right track. So I, but now, this is easy though, because here Paul tells us in verse 11, now all these things happen unto them for examples, and they are written for our admonition, not the person sitting next to you, not the people down the street in another church, you and I, right here and now.

So let's take a look at Israel in the wilderness, starting at verse 10, and he's going to make a lot of comments here, I might, well let's, I'll just jump in. Verse 10, moreover brethren, Paul says, 1 Corinthians chapter 10, verse 1, moreover brethren, I would not that ye should be ignorant that all our fathers were under the cloud and all passed through the sea, and were all baptized unto Moses in the cloud and in the sea, and did all eat the same spiritual food, and did all drink the same spiritual drink.

For they all drank that spiritual rock that followed them, and that rock was, was Christ. And by the way, we're not going to take the time tonight, because that's, I leave the easy stuff, you know, aside.

Take rock or stone throughout the scripture from beginning to end, and it's an amazing study. It's an amazing study. The rock that gave, that was struck, that was smitten for you and I, gives forth water.

A second time, it was to give forth water, and Moses didn't follow directions, and he smitten, he wasn't supposed to, and that's when he lost his commission. But again, there was lessons the Lord was trying to teach in terms of that rock.

The stone cut without hands. The stone in Daniel 2, in Nebuchadnezzar's vision, all the way through the scripture. That's a study you can take on your own with a commentary, rock, stone, whatever, study it through.

You'll be amazed how the Holy Spirit indulges in puns from cover to cover, and again and again and again, it points to none other than the Mashiach of Israel. And here is one of those places, and there's many, but this is one of those places where that's not some coincidental, harebrained, Chuck Missler idea.

Paul himself indulges in that pun right here. You see, the rock that followed them, and that rock was Christ. Christ is intended to be visible in the Torah, in the Pentateuch. But that's another study.

But with many of them God was not well pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness. And now these things were our examples to the intent that we should not lust after evil things as they also lusted.

We're going to go into some other studies here. Before we charge into the specifics here, let me just summarize some other insights about Israel in the wilderness. There is some typology going on, in addition to the actual historical event of Egypt and Pharaoh and Israel.

The Holy Spirit has also used that typologically. Egypt is a type, or model, of what? The world. The world. Pharaoh is a type of the prince of this world, right? Okay. Moses was the person, supernaturally called to be the deliverer.

He was their leader, and thus is a type of Jesus Christ. The Red Sea here is even made a model of baptism. The pillar, the cloud, the fire, the Shekinah glory is a type of Holy Spirit. Manna, the bread of life, right?

Or even denotatively, that's connotatively, denotatively the Lord's Supper, if you will. And there's references made to that throughout the epistles and things. And the water from the smitten rock, the living water.

You know, you can go on and on and on. And those things are not out in left field, they're central theology and not a problem. But here Paul is writing to the Corinthians about being those that were overthrown in the wilderness.

But with many of them God was not well pleased, for they were overthrown in the wilderness. And now these things were our examples to the intent that we should not lust after evil things as they also lusted.

We're going to go into some other studies here. Before we charge into the specifics here, let me just summarize some other insights about Israel in the wilderness. In the wilderness, there is some typology going on in addition to the actual historical event of Egypt and Pharaoh and Israel.

The Holy Spirit has also used that typologically. Egypt is a type or model of what? The world. Pharaoh is a type of the prince of this world, right? Moses was the person supernaturally called to be the deliverer.

He was their leader and thus is a type of Jesus Christ. The Red Sea here is even made a model of baptism. The pillar, the cloud, the fire, the Shekinah glory is a type of Holy Spirit, fair enough. Manna, the bread of life, right?

Or even denotatively, that's connotatively, denotatively the Lord's Supper, if you will. And there's references made to that throughout the epistles and things. And the water from the smitten rock, the living water, you know, you can go on and on and on and those things are not out in left field, they're central theology and not a problem.

But here Paul is writing to the Corinthians about being those that were overthrown in the wilderness. The people that were overthrown were out of Egypt, but not in Canaan. Understand where they were at.

They're probably where all you and I are at. Out of Egypt, the very fact in this Bible study implies you're called out of the world, at least at some level of maturity, and yet the presumption I'm making is that we're not crossed over the Jordan.

Now this leads to another issue that I won't have time to develop fully here, but I commend to you the Joshua tapes if you're interested in this. There is, there are some misconceptions about the typology of Canaan and the Jordan.

And these misconceptions emerge out of some naive songs. Crossing over the Jordan isn't dying. Canaan, the promised land, is not heaven. Chuck, what do you mean? Because there's battles there. I don't expect when we get to heaven to have to draw a sword and, you know, I mean that's not what the scripture in my view teaches.

Canaan has battles. It has victories. When Joshua led the children of Israel into Canaan, there were victories, there were also defeats. But the idea of crossing over into the promised land was to enter into that which God has for us.

And that's preached upon by the writer of the epistle to Hebrews in chapters 3 and 4. We'll make a brief allusion to that tonight. And it's also part of what Paul's talking about here in 1 Corinthians 10.

So the first idea is to recognize that while it's undesirable to wander in the wilderness and it's desirable to cross over the Jordan and get into Canaan land, don't equate that with dying and going to heaven or you miss the point.

You with me? There's something God would have you cross over and enter into while you're here in your walk into his rest, taking advantage of his promises in a more comprehensive way than most of us do.

Most of us make a 40-year wandering of an 11-day journey. That's what Paul is trying to tell us. That's why Israel spent those 38 years wandering around, is to give us an example of understanding that had they accepted God's word on faith, they would have entered into the promised land 38 years earlier.

It was their unbelief that kept them from appropriating to themselves that which God had provided for. And you and I are in the same boat. We don't appropriate to ourselves all that God has for us. And that's what I believe is the main theme here in 1 Corinthians 10 and Hebrews 3 and 4 and other passages of like kind.

When you think of Canaan, don't think of heaven. Think of victory. Now, is this a theme appropriate to the church? Yes. 1 Corinthians 10, Hebrews 3 and 4 and Revelation chapter 3. Remember the letter to Sardis?

Remember the seven letters of seven churches? I won't review all that tonight. If you know what I'm talking about, review your notes. If not, forget it. No, it would be too hard to explain. Remember, we love the seven letters of seven churches, especially as Protestants, we love to work over the Catholics and Thyatira, right?

The one that follows Thyatira was Sardis, and if Thyatira is the Catholics, which is not that simple, but if it was, then Sardis is the Reformation. Sardis is one of the two churches of which nothing good is said.

So before we get too proud as Protestants, read Sardis carefully. Thou hast a name written, but art dead, Jesus says to the church at Sardis. A name, a denomination, a label, a banner, but no life. And that's what I believe we're talking about here.

Wandering in the wilderness rather than crossing over and conquering. That's the issue. Now, there's an analogy I was going to get into, but I have a feeling if I get too far off the track, we won't even get through verse five tonight.

That's Lazarus. Remember Lazarus? He had three stages. He was dead, but then he was raised from the dead. And he was entangled in his grave clothes. The second stage was to get him unentangled. He was dead, he was defeated.

When he was undefeated, he became dangerous. Dead, defeated, and dangerous. He was so dangerous, they had a plot against his life, if you recall. We're in the same boat. We're out of Egypt, wandering around the wilderness and grabbing a promise here and there, but not embracing the whole counsel of God, not entering in to that rest, as he calls it in Hebrews.

I think we got down, what, to verse five. Verse six, now, these things were our examples to the intent that we should not lust after evil things as they lusted, neither be idolaters as were some of them.

As it is written, the people sat down to eat and to drink and rose up to play. That phrase has to do when the leader was out of sight, up the hill, and they got the golden calf thing going, remember? The leader was out of sight.

We get in trouble when our leader's out of sight. And, of course, they indulge in idolatry, right? Is idolatry, well, sure, that's a threat for the Old Testament types, sure. Gee, Paul's talking to the Corinthian church, a worldly church.

Do they have a threat of idolatry? Sure. And that's going to come up again in verse fourteen. This thing's going to climax in verse four, this passage is going to climax in verse fourteen. Wherefore, my dearly beloved, flee from idolatry.

John writes that in his first letter. John 5 .21, little children, keep yourself from idols. How many of you have an idol at home? I don't mean a little, you know, sort of a shrine with candles and some kind of thing.

What is an idol? Anything that you put between you and the Lord. Anything that displaces His rightful place in your life is an idol. You start defining it that way and you can make quite a long list. We all have them.

We may not call them that. But the emphasis, not just in the Old Testament, but in the New. First Corinthians 10. Letters of, you know, John and so forth. Caution us to flee from idolatry. And the idolatry that I think threatens us is not the idolatry of some denomination that probably the people in this room don't subscribe to anyway.

The idolatry is the idolatry that you and I create, embrace, and establish in our life. It can be a career. It can be a hobby. It can be any passion that ought to be a passion you have for the Lord and the things of Him.

Going on, verse 8. Neither let us commit fornication as some of them committed and fell in one day three and twenty thousand. Direct fornication is obviously a gigantic problem in our society. There's derivative aspects of it.

Movies, novels, television, music. Some of the music I think would shock Paul that you and I play on our radios. Some of us don't listen carefully or we turn it off. Galatians 5 .13 says, Ye have been called to liberty, only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh.

That broadens the definition considerably. Small point. Some of you who have been various... And incidentally, this whole thing, this says fell in one day three and twenty thousand. For those of you that want to track that down, and I won't take the time tonight, now, but you can through your notes, is Numbers 25.