A Report from the Lord

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Well, for those of you that came to hear, husband, father, doctor, pastor, elder, professor, podcaster, my closest friend, Keith Foskey, I'm sorry to disappoint you.
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Well, if you will open your Bibles to the book of Obadiah, and don't feel bad, I know most people probably didn't read that book this week, if you need to look in your table of contents, that's fine.
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If you know where the book of John is, just turn one page.
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It's right there.
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If you'll stand with me, we're going to read the whole chapter.
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It's only one.
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It's 21 verses.
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The vision of Obadiah.
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Thus says the Lord God concerning Edom.
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We have heard a report from the Lord, and an envoy has been sent among the nations, saying, Arise, let us go against her for battle.
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Behold, I will make you small among the nations.
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You are greatly despised.
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The arrogance of your heart has deceived you.
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You who live in the clefts of the rocks, in the loftiness of your dwelling place, who say in your heart, Who will bring me down to the earth? Though you build your nest like an eagle in the air.
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Though you set your nest among the stars, from there I will bring you down, declares the Lord.
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If thieves come to you, and if a robber comes to you by night, oh, how you will be ruined.
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Would they not steal only until they had had enough? And if great gatherers came to you, would they not leave some gleanings? Oh, how Esau, you will be ransacked, and his hidden treasures will be searched out.
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All the men allied with you will send you forth to your border, and the men at peace with you, they will deceive you, and they will overpower you, and they will eat your bread and will set an ambush for you.
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There is no understanding within him.
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Will I not on that day, declares the Lord, destroy wise men from Edom, and an understanding from the mountain of Esau? Then you mighty men will be dismayed, O Timon, so that every one may be cut off from the mountain of Esau by a great slaughter.
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Because of the violence that you have done to your brother Jacob, you will be covered with shame, and you will be cut off forever.
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On the day that you stood aloof, and the day that the strangers carried off his wealth, and the foreigners entered his gates, and they cast lots for Jerusalem, you were one of them.
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Do not gloat over your brother's day, the day of his misfortune, and do not rejoice over the sons of Judah and their day of destruction.
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Yes, do not boast in their day of distress.
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Do not enter the gate of my people in the day of their disaster.
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Yes, you do not gloat over their calamity in that disastrous day.
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And do not loot their wealth in that day of their disaster.
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Do not stand at the fork of the road and cut down their fugitives, and do not imprison their survivors in the day of distress.
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For the day of the Lord draws near upon all nations.
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As you have done, it will be done to you.
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Your dwellings will return upon your head.
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Because you have drank on my holy mountain, all the nations will drink continually.
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They will drink, and they will swallow, and they will become as if they had never existed.
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But on Mount Zion, there will be those who escape, and it will be holy, and the house of Jacob will possess their possessions, and the house of Jacob will be afire, and the house of Joseph will be like a flame.
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But the house of Esau will burn like stubble, and they will be set and be consumed with fire, so that there will be no survivor of the house of Esau.
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For the Lord hath spoken, and those of the Negev will possess the Mount Esau, and those of Shiflop, the Philistine plain, also will possess the territory of Ephraim, and the territory of Samaria.
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And Benjamin will possess the Gilead, and the exiles of the host of the sons of Israel, who are among the Canaanites, as far as Zarephath.
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And the exiles of Jerusalem, who are in Zephrad, and they will possess the cities of the Negev.
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And the deliverers will ascend upon Mount Zion to judge the Mount of Esau.
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For the kingdom will be the Lord's.
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Let's pray.
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Father God, I pray that you would give me the strength at this moment to proclaim your truth from your word with power, and with clarity, and with understanding.
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Father, if you do not fill me with your spirit at this moment, anoint me with the Holy Ghost, that, Father God, I would just be a bag of wind.
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I pray that, Father God, as the words of this prophet are expounded, that, Father, hearts would be transformed today, that, Father, as the word is preached, you have say, you grant, as the word is preached, life unto life, and death unto death.
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But, Father God, my prayer today is that, as this word is preached, you will grant life and life eternal.
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And, Father God, I pray for those in this room that do not know you, that today would be the day of salvation, and that Christ would be put on display as the King of kings, and the Lord of lords, and the one who will judge the living and the dead.
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In Christ's name, amen.
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Well, in the providence of God, I will have the opportunity, the coming weeks and months ahead to have more opportunities to proclaim God's word in the pulpit.
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And, I had, just months ago, eating dinner on a Friday night with my wife, said, man, what a great opportunity I would like to have at some point to begin to look at some of the obscure prophets in the Old Testament, the smaller prophets that we are much neglected.
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So, it wasn't, not a week or so after that, Keith asked me to preach, and I was like, well, thanks Lord, you have given me the desire of my heart.
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So, as we open to the book of Obadiah, and I know it is an obscure prophet, and I know this may some, to some of you, you may not have a clue.
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So, I'm going to give you some background of the book, and if you have any questions afterwards, be more than glad to come up and talk to me.
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But, the name Obadiah, Obed, meaning servant, Ayah, meaning Yahweh.
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So, he is the servant of Yahweh, and we don't know who he is.
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The word, the name Obadiah is used anywhere between 11 and 20 times in the Old Testament, but it's not the same individual.
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So, we don't know who this person is.
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We have no genealogy.
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This is it.
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This is all we know.
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And, he said, he got this vision from the Lord, and he was going to speak it.
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Now, the dating of this book is somewhat debated.
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It is, some believe it was in the 9th century, and I understand how they come to that conclusion.
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Some of that is at the time of, if you want to go back and look, it's in 2 Chronicles chapter 20, where you had Jehoshaphat, which was the son of Asa, good king or bad king? Anybody remember? Asa, good king, bad king.
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Good king.
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Asa was a good king.
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And, his son, Jehoshaphat, made an alliance with the northern Israel for protection.
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Well, there's only two kings in the southern kingdom that served at the same time.
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They were co-region.
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It was Jehoram and Jehoshaphat, because he'd gotten sick.
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Well, he continued on for protection with the northern apostate nations, or tribes, for protection.
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And, at that time, Jehoshaphat died.
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Jehoram, then being an evil king, sought help from the northern kingdom, Ahaziah.
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God said, you're not to do that.
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You're to trust in me.
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He sent a prophet to him.
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He struck him with intestinal disease, where his intestines came out.
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And, then, the Edomites came in.
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They ransacked his palace.
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Then, they hauled off all of his family.
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They hauled off all of his treasures.
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And, they killed all of his sons.
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So, I understand how they kind of come to that conclusion.
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But, it never dealt with the destruction of the temple, or the destruction of Jerusalem.
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So, my dating, and I'm not the only one.
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So, there's other men, more godly than I, that come to this conclusion.
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I believe this was in the 6th century, and it was in the time and contemporary of Jeremiah.
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And, one reason why I hold that is, Jeremiah quotes him.
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He quotes.
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He has the same condemnation towards the Edomites that Obadiah does.
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And, we'll get into that as we continue on.
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So, it says, and we'll start like I always do.
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Verse 1.
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The vision of Obadiah.
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Obscure individual.
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We don't know who he is.
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But, he says this, and he proclaims it boldly.
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Thus says the Lord God concerning Edom.
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Well, some of you may be sitting here today and go, well, who the world is Edom? Well, if you go back, you can even listen to the teachings that we did, or that Keith preached in Genesis 25.
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You can go back and find out.
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You want to go back and look, you can make a note of it.
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It gives the recollection of Jacob and Esau.
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Where the birthright and the blessing were both stolen.
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And, it said that he did it for a bowl of red porridge.
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And, then it says he winds up being the descendants of Edom.
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Edom meaning red men.
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And, that's what he, remember when he came out when he was born, he was a hairy white dude.
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So, that's where Edom is.
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It says, in verse 1, it says, and we have heard a report from the Lord.
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The Lord is speaking this judgment of condemnation on this nation.
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Look, anytime God speaks in the Old Testament, and He gives a judgment.
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He is speaking as the judge of all things.
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He gives the condemnation.
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He gives the evidence for the condemnation.
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And, just like a perfect judge does, at some point, He executes that judgment.
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And, that is what's going to take place.
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And, He says, I have heard a report from the Lord.
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And, an envoy has been sent among you from the nations.
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Arise, and let us go up against the battle against Edom.
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So, who is sending these armies against Edom? It's God.
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It's God that's going to judge this nation.
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He's going to judge them with battle.
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In verse 2, it says, but behold, I will make you small among the nations, and you are greatly despised.
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It says that God's going to be the one to make them small among the nations.
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That it's God who sees them as being despised.
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And, He says, why He says they're despised, and why He's going to make them small.
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In verse 3, it says, the arrogance of your heart has deceived you.
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Pride comes before a fall, and a haughty spirit before destruction.
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That's what Proverbs 16, 18 says.
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Pride comes before a fall.
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And, the Edomites, the descendants of Esau say right here, the arrogance of your heart has deceived you.
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You who live in the clefts of rocks.
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Well, when we think about the Edomites, and we think about who they are, and all of their descendants, where they landed was in a very rough terrain.
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Some of you may have heard of these cities, Basra, Teman, or maybe even Pella.
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And, these were, or Petra, very rocks everywhere.
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So, what they did, is they put themselves up high in the rocks, anywhere between 40 to 250 feet in the air.
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And, they built these basically cities inside the rocks.
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And, if you want to go home, and you want to Google it, look up at the city Petra.
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It sits way up in the air, and it's inside the rocks.
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They chiseled, and blew out palaces, and just absolutely architectural masterpieces.
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And, we do know that the Edomites, and the descendants of Esau, were architectural geniuses.
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Because, y'all know who the Herods are.
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The Herods were the descendants of the Edomites.
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And, if you know anything about history, they put their fortresses, like Fortress Masada, which I've been there, absolutely breathtaking, in the Qumran Valley.
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It's way up on a hill, or up on a mountain.
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And, they blasted out these palaces, so that they're way up in the air.
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That if armies came in to invade them, they could pick them off from 250 plus feet in the air.
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Absolutely amazing.
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And, when the Herods were put in power by the Romans, it was Herod that did all of the architectural improvements to the temple complex.
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Because, him being an Edomite, he could not come into the temple.
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Therefore, he said, if I can't come in, where supposedly I should have been part of the covenant, then I'll expand that, and Herod the Great did that very thing.
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But, he says, you live in the clefts of the rocks, in the loftiness of your dwelling, and you say in your heart, who will bring me down? Well, Petra being, and at that time it would have been Cella, would have been the capital city of Edom.
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As you would come into that city, up on that cliff, there was a narrow opening to get to that city that had a range from 15 feet to 30 feet across.
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And, there were 250 feet in the air.
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It was said that 12 men, historians say 12 men, in that time, could keep off a whole army of men by just picking them off as they came through that.
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And, they said, hey, we're impenetrable where we're at.
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Nobody's going to take us down.
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Who's going to come up here and get us? Well, he says, because we have, in verse 4 it says, because we have built our nests like the eagle.
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We have set our nests up in the stars, and God says, I will be the one to bring you down.
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You say, who will bring me down? God says, I have that answer.
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I'll be the one to do that.
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He says, even if you put your palaces and your fortress in the stars, I will crush you, because I'm the one who makes the mountains.
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I'm the one who makes the stars.
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The earth is my footstool, and I hold all of the stars in the palm of my hand.
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God had crushed him, just gone, just like that, if he wanted to.
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He said, but it's the arrogance of your heart to think yourself sufficient.
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Who gave those men the brilliant minds to build such structures? Who gave those men the minds of military to do the defeats and the feats that they did? It was God.
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I'll even say to you today, just a little quick point of application.
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How do you think you got here today? You think you did it under your own power? Who gave you the ability to put one foot in front of the other, to get to the shower, to get to the car? Who gave you the ability to stick the key in the ignition, or in some cases, push the button? Put the gas in your car.
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Who provided the strength for you to work, to provide the money to pay for the gas that you put in your car? It was God.
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We don't do anything that's not done by the foreknowledge and counsel and decree of God.
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How many of you right now are saying, heart, keep beating? No.
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God's keeping your heart beating.
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What's keeping your lungs filling up with oxygen? It's God.
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Esau, the Edomites, said, I'm the one that does that.
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And God says, and you know what? I declare to you, I will bring you down.
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And he says, and when I bring you down, in verse 5, he says, thieves are going to come to you, and robbers are going to come to you by night, and, oh, what a ruin it will be.
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And listen to what he says.
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He says, would they not steal only until they had enough? Look, if a robber breaks in, or a home invasion, robbery, whatever scenario you want to use, they're going to go in, they're going to do what they're going to do, they're going to get what they can get very quickly and get out.
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That's not what he's saying here.
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He said, even, and I'll explain to you.
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He says, even if they were coming to get all your grapes, if they were going to come to your fields and steal your grapes and your vineyards, they're only going to get as much as they can get, so that they can then skedaddle on down the road and get away.
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That's not what God says here.
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He says, Esau, in verse 6, oh Esau, you will be ransacked.
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There ain't going to be nothing left when I send these guys.
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He says, even your hidden treasures, they're going to be sought out.
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All those things you have hidden in those caves and all that stuff, they're going to be ripped out.
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You are going to be stripped bare.
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It's funny how, well to me, my mind's a little different than y'all's.
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You listen to some of the prophets and how they speak.
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I mean, it is absolutely ruthless.
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Speaking to their enemies.
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There's one time in Zephaniah, it says that he cannot wait for the day when God comes and he lays you open from neck to thigh.
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I'm like, yes, that's my guy.
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Verse 7.
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He said, you've trusted in the fact that you've put yourself up in the air.
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You've trusted in your own treasures.
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He says, now, all the men that you have allied with, they're going to send you to the borders.
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He says, look, all these men that you made allies with, whether it was through history, the Nabataeans, the ones that actually came in and tried to set them up during the Hasmonean dynasty and all that further on down in history.
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The Egyptians, all those people.
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And it was one day be the Romans.
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Those men are actually going to be the ones that are going to send you running for your borders.
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He says, these men are at peace with you.
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You will be deceived because they will overpower you.
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All the alliances that they had made are fixing to be abandoned by those people and they're going to actually turn on them.
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It says in verse 7 as well, it says, and they who eat your bread, they're going to set an ambush for you.
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Imagine sitting down at the table tonight, eating with someone, having a nice meal, and the next thing you know, you turn off the lights, snuggle into the bed with your wife, and boom, right through the back door, that man comes in and starts robbing you.
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That's what he says.
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And there's going to be no understanding in those men for you.
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There's going to be no compassion when they come through.
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Verse 8 says, God says, then when I come through there, I'm going to take everybody that you trusted in, everybody that gave you counsel, and I'm going to wipe them clean.
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He says, and I'll do it as far as from the understanding of the Mount of Esau.
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That's where they had took off when they had left Jacob and Isaac.
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They took off, and they went to Mount Seir.
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He said, Once again, he's just doubling down on it.
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Look, this is going to be a slaughter, and I'm going to wipe the city and your country clean.
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There's not going to be anybody left from you.
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And you go, man, why is he doing that? Why is God saying this? What reason does God have to do this to a whole nation? Verse 10, Is that what you're translating? Everybody bother to say that? No, no, no, no.
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It says, Because of what they did to their brother, Jacob.
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Look, Jacob was a crafty, deceiving, conniving, heel catcher.
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Right? That's what he was.
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But he was, Esau was still told, you're going to serve your younger brother.
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You're to submit to the decree of God.
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You're to submit to what I'm saying you're to do.
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And he did not.
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He could not wait for the mourning of his dad to die, till he could do what? Kill his brother.
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That's what it says.
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It says in Genesis 27, verse 41, After all that's done, I'm going to kill you.
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That's why he had to take off and get in bondage to Laban.
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It says, That didn't only happen then.
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That carried on through the descendants of Esau.
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In Numbers chapter 20, when they come to the land of Edom, and they're wanting to pass through during the Exodus.
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Do you all remember what they said? He said, don't come through here.
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Moses says, wait a minute.
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We're going to come through here.
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I know there's a bunch of us, a bunch of kids, and a bunch of cattle.
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And I know we like to eat.
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So as we come through here, we're not going to eat any of your food.
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We're not going to drink any of your water.
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We won't touch anything.
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We won't move to the right or to the left.
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There's a thing called the King's Highway.
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He says, we're going to stay on the King's Highway, and we won't touch anything.
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He said, now water is free.
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That's a gift from God.
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But you know what? If we do decide to drink some water, we'll pay for it.
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And if there's a toll to pass through your city and through this, we'll pay it.
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And the King of Edom said, you ain't coming this way.
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And if you come out, we're going to slaughter you.
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Moses said, well, you know that we have been mishandled, and your fathers before us, they've all been mishandled by the Egyptians.
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And he says, we don't care.
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That was violence against their brother.
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Violence.
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Also showed violence in 586 B.C.
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when they had the opportunity to help their brother, and they did not.
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And that's what we're fixing to talk about.
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In 586 B.C., they had the opportunity to come to the aid of their brother, and they did not.
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You understand that when God sent the Babylonians to come in there and to basically stomp the covenant people down like mud in the streets, you go, well, yeah, but God, that was the judgment of God.
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But you do understand God still said, you should want to help your brother in a time of distress? And they did not.
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They actually helped.
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Look at verse 11.
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On that day, you stood aloof on the day that the strangers carried off his wealth.
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Look, they stood back like this and just watched all the invading army come into the Babylonians, hauled off the people, hauled off those in slavery, ransacked the temple, ransacked the king's palace.
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They looted everything, and they didn't do anything about it.
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Let me read for you.
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It's not just Obadiah that condemns these men for this.
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These are some lengthy passages, but these are just a few.
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Edom was the primary country of God's wrath above all in the Old Testament.
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Let me read these to you.
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Look at Isaiah 34.
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This is verses 5 through 8.
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My sword is satiated in heaven.
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Behold, it shall descend from judgment upon Edom and upon the people whom I have devoted for destruction.
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The sword of the Lord is filled with blood.
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It's satiated with fat, the blood of lambs and goats, and with the fat of the kidneys and rams, the Lord is going to sacrifice Basra.
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I will make a great slaughter in Edom.
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Wild oxen will fail, young bulls will become weak, and the land will be soaked with blood, and the dust, they'll become as greasy fat.
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The Lord has had a vengeance.
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He will take out on that day for what they have done to Zion.
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Listen to what Ezekiel says.
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Chapter 25, verses 12 through 14.
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Thus says the Lord, Because Edom has acted against the house of Judah this way, I will take vengeance, and has incurred a great guilt against him, and will avenge themselves upon them.
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Therefore, thus says the Lord, I will stretch out my hand against Edom, and I will cut off every man, every beast, and I will lay it to waste.
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From Tinman to Dedan, they will all fall by my sword.
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I will lay my vengeance on Edom and all of the people of Israel.
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Thus says the Lord, I will do according to Edom because of my anger and wrath towards them, and the vengeance for what they have done to my people.
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Therefore, declares the Lord, I will deal with you according to my anger and according to my envy, and I will show this because of my hatred against you.
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So I will make myself known as the judge of you.
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That's what God said.
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Then in Jeremiah, listen to this.
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Flee away, turn back, dwell in the depths, O habits of Dedan, for I will bring a great disaster upon the house of Esau, and I will punish him.
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If great gatherers come up to glean, they will not be able to glean much.
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If thieves come at night, they will be destroyed until they've had enough, but I will strip Esau bare.
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I have uncovered his hiding places so that he will not be able to conceal himself.
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His offspring will be destroyed along with his relatives and all of his neighbors.
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Leave your orphans behind.
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I'll take care of them and leave your widows so that it will trust in me.
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For thus says the Lord, Behold, those who are not sentenced to drink this cup, they're going to drink it now.
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You will not be acquitted, and you will drink my cup.
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For I have sworn by my name, declares the Lord, that Bozrah will be an object of horror, an object of reproach, an object of ruin and curse, and I will do this in all the cities till Edom is perpetually ruined.
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Edom will become an object of horror.
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Everyone who passes by it will hiss, and they will be horrified by its destruction.
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Just like I overthrew Sodom and Gomorrah and its neighbors, thus says the Lord, who will nobody live there again, and there won't be anybody left residing.
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God ain't playing.
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Listen to what Amos says.
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Thus says the Lord, Three transgressions of Edom, and four, I will not revoke from its punishment, because he pursued his brother with the sword while he stiffened and stifled his companions.
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His anger also tore continually against him, and he maintained his fury against him forever.
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So I will set a fire upon Teman, and I will consume Bozrah.
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And Joel 3.19, Egypt will become a waste, and Edom will become a wasteland as a wilderness.
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And because the violence that they did unto Judah in those days, because they had shed innocent blood.
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You understand that the way that they had treated the Edomites, the descendants of Esau, had treated the house of Jacob, the promised covenant people of God.
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God says, I'm going to wipe you off the map.
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But listen to what God says how Jacob and Israel was supposed to treat Edomites.
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He says this in Deuteronomy 23, before they cross over into the Jordan, he says this, No Ammonite or Moabite shall enter the assembly of the Lord, none of their descendants, even to the tenth generation.
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And they shall not enter the assembly of the Lord, because they did not meet you with food and with water on the way when you came out of Egypt.
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And because they hired against you Balaam the son of Peor of Mesopotamia to curse you.
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Nevertheless, says the Lord God, although God was not willing to listen to Balaam, but the Lord your God turned the curse into a blessing for you because on that day, and here's what he says, you shall not seek their prosperity nor peace in them all of your days.
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You will not detest an Edomite.
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Dude, they just chased all your family out with swords and all of these things, and God says you do not detest your brother.
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Esau was your brother, you don't detest him, because he's your brother.
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And you don't detest an Egyptian, even though they had treat you harshly, because you too are an alien in the land in which you're going.
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That's what God says, this is how you're supposed to act to those very people that persecuted you, that were harsh to you, that were your enemy.
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Is that not what the Lord said on the Sermon on the Mount? Bless those who persecute you.
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Love those who despitefully persecute you.
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Leave the judgment to God.
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He can do it perfectly.
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And it goes on to say, that on that day, the strangers were carried off and as well, verse 11, that the foreigners entered the gate and they cast lots for Jerusalem.
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So as they stood afar off, and they watched all of these people march in, in the Babylonian exile.
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They stood afar off.
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They watched foreign people come in and cast lots for what they were going to take from Jerusalem, when it was laid waste.
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And then he says, did you watch? He says at the last thing of verse 11, he said, you were one of them.
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Once again man, that'd be terrible, to have your door kicked in, to be bound.
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These men ransack your house, haul off your wife into slavery, your children, and who comes right behind them? Your brother.
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Your brother.
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That's what he's saying.
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You were one of them, Edom.
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When they did all those things, you came in right behind them.
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And verse 12 says, do not gloat over your brother in that day.
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The word gloat, sometimes we think of gloat as just looking from afar.
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Well the idea of gloating here, is they were looking into Jerusalem to see what they could take.
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He says don't gloat over on your brother's day, his day of misfortune.
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Do not rejoice over the sons of Judah when they are being destroyed.
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They should have been weeping that their brother is being banished from Jerusalem, being laid waste.
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He said, you should not rejoice over that, but yep, you boasted.
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You boasted in their day of distress.
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And verse 13, do not enter the gate of my people in their day of disaster.
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Yes, don't gloat over them in their calamity.
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In the day of their disaster, don't loot their wealth, for this is their day of destruction.
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They were doing exactly what God told them not to do.
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Turn your Bible over real quick to Psalm.
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Psalm 137.
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This was written by those in exile.
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By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down and wept, and we remembered Zion upon the willows in the midst of it, and hung our harps, and our captors demanded that we play them a song, and our tormentors of mirth sang, sing us one of those songs of joy from Zion.
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How can we sing the Lord's songs in this foreign land if I forget you, O Jerusalem? May my right hand forget her skill.
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May my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth if I do not remember you, and if I do not exalt Jerusalem above all the chief of my joy.
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Oh, remember us, O Lord, and remember against the sons of Edom in the day of Jerusalem when they said this, raise it up, raise it up, crush it to its very foundation.
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Oh, daughter of Babylon, you left us devastated.
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Oh, blessed be the ones who repays Edom with the recompense which he paid us.
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How blessed is the one who seizes their infants and dashes them upon the rocks.
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Doesn't he explain what he meant there? He said, take the babies and crush their heads on the rocks.
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God's not playing with Edom.
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God's not playing with the enemies of His people.
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He says in verse 14, do not stand at the fork of the road and do not cut down their fugitives.
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Do not imprison the survivors in the day of distress.
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Historical writing says as they were people fleeing the city, running into through the desert lands trying to find safety, that the Edomites were picking them off and then turning them over to the Babylonians.
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I mean, look, me and my brother had some issues growing up, but I would never turn him over to his enemy.
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Never.
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This is what he's doing.
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He's doing that which is abhorred in the sight of God.
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In verse 15, for the day of the Lord draws near on all the nations.
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As you have done, it will be done to you and your dealings will return to your own head.
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You want to call this lex talionis, the law of retaliation from God.
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That's fine because that's what he's going to do.
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But this is retributive justice from God.
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What you did to your brother, the ruthless acts that you did to my covenant people, I'm going to do them to you.
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And I'm going to do them in such a way that you're wiped clean off the face of the earth.
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We see retributive justice at times even carried out on God's people.
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You remember the horrible act of King David taking Bathsheba as he called her into himself knowing that was Uriah.
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If you remember who Uriah was, one of his valiant men.
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That was one of his best.
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That was one of his homeboys.
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That was one of his buds.
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Who is she? Oh, that's Uriah the Hittite.
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Well, I want her.
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Bring her to me.
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When he laid with Bathsheba, committed that very act, and he was confronted by Nathan with that bony finger, he said, you're the man.
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He then repented.
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Oh, man, you've got to read that passage.
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Nathan said to him, God's not going to kill you now.
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You understand what God was fixing to do to King David? He wouldn't have repented.
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It says it was going to kill him.
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Well, then he gets condemnation on the rest of his life.
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He says, because of what you did to Uriah, the sword will not leave from your house.
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And if you know anything about the rest of his life, it was turmoil within his house.
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The raping of the incest in that, the Absalom trying.
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One of those condemnations was that your closest neighbor will sleep with your own concubines.
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And if you know anything about Absalom, he slept with his own dad's concubines.
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He tried to overthrow his kingdom.
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And then he wound up being killed by Joab, David's closest valiant man.
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That was retributive justice carried out on David because of the sins.
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He says, okay, because what you did to Uriah through the hand of the Ammonites, I'm going to let the sword stay in your house.
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But God was still gracious to forgive David.
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In this case, there's no forgiveness for Edom.
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There's none.
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Jacob, I love.
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Edom, I hate it.
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Because you drank on my holy mountain on that day, all the nations will drink continually.
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They will drink and swallow and become as if they never existed.
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God's saying here, hey, when you went up on that Mount Zion, the holy mountain, that's what the holy mountain was, Mount Zion, Jerusalem.
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And you went in there, and you was partying, having a good time, wearing all their beautiful clothing, eating all their good food in the temple and in the palace, drinking all their wine, partying it up.
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He says, you want to drink? I'm going to let you drink it, and you're going to drink my wrath, and you're going to drink it down to the very last dreg.
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That's what he says.
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He says, I'm going to make you drink it until they never exist.
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Then, in verse 17, he says, but on Mount Zion, there will be those who will escape, and it will be holy, and the house of Jacob will possess their possessions.
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Now, here's the promise that there's going to be those that will escape, and some of God's people still, the covenant gods of people will still be escaped, and they were going to be preserved.
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He says, the house of Jacob will possess their possession.
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Hey, there's coming a day when this is all going to pass.
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I'm going to deal with them, and the house of Jacob, the covenant people of God are going to have their land.
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Look at verses 18 through 21.
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It says, and then the house of Jacob will be like a fire, and the house of Joseph a flame.
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House of Joseph, house of Jacob, meaning these two kingdoms, which used to be at odds with one another, the northern and southern kingdom, that will become together.
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We see a lot of that in the prophecy of the new covenant where the house of Judah and the house of Israel will be one.
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That's what this is speaking of.
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But the house of Esau will be as stubble.
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They will be set, they will be set them on fire and will be consumed so that there will be no house of Esau ever again.
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This is what the Lord has spoken.
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The promise to God's people.
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All that, look, this prophecy, what's going to happen to the Edomites was probably encouraging to a certain degree that, hey, these people that have been wrong to us, that have mistreated us, that God has promised to wipe them off the face of the earth.
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But in their mind, you have to be just that those were in exile.
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Well, when are we going to get what God promised us back? Well, he says here, the house of Jacob, they'll get their possessions.
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And in verse 18, the house of Jacob will be like a fire.
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And it says that Joseph like a flame, Esau will be consumed.
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And that was the decree of God.
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God says this will happen because I have spoken.
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Those of the Negev will possess the mountain of Esau.
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The possessions of Esau are now going to go to God's people.
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Those of the Shephelah, the Philistine plain, also the possessions of the territory of Ephraim and the territory of Samaria and Benjamin, they're going to get their possession in Gilead.
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God says all that stuff I have taken away from you and all those things that I did and used all the exile to chastise you, I'm going to give all that back to you.
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And he says right here in verse 20, the exiles of the host of the sons of Israel will be among the Canaanites as far as Zarephath.
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So he's saying, look, even when I disperse those of Israel, remember Israel's northern apostate kingdom, he said those I even sent out in 1722 by the hands of the Assyrians, I'm going to bring that remnant back as well.
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And the exiles of Jerusalem who were in the Sherephath, they will possess the cities of the Negev.
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The deliverers will send upon Mount Zion to judge the mountain of Esau and the kingdom will be the Lord's.
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That is the promise that God's going to give his people.
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In their mind, they did not understand all of this prophecy.
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There's no way they could have.
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Some of these people never even saw some of this take place.
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But the promise that God was going to give his people, put them back into their land, put them back where they could worship God in spirit and truth.
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The promise is here and that is what God did.
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Now you say, well, big deal.
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How does that apply to us? I'm glad you asked.
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Don't mess with God's people.
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Serious.
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Don't mess with God's people.
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If you're here today and you're God's chosen people, God will vindicate those who have done you wrong.
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He has promised to his people that he will take care of them.
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He has promised his people that although, look man, we've got churches all over the world being persecuted, butchered, burned, raped, pillaged.
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We don't have those problems here yet.
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We could.
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God says, don't worry about that.
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My promises to you are faithful.
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And that I will get them.
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You leave that to me.
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So there's another promise.
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Not only a promise to you and I that God's going to watch out for his people, but he has promised he's going to slay his enemies.
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I don't know about y'all, man, but I'm thankful for that.
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It might be a sinful inclination on my part.
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Lord, forgive me.
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But when I see God's people being persecuted and you see the butchery and the barbarism that happens in other places of the globe, man, I can't help but pray the impeccable psalm.
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God, dry them up like a noonday slug on the pavement.
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Why? Because I love God's people.
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And I have compassion for them.
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And I don't want to see them injured.
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I want God to smite them off the face of the earth.
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If they're not the elect, God, just wipe them out.
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Good thing I'm not God.
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Because I'd just wipe them all clean.
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Make it all desolate.
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It'd be unjust if I did it.
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The other application is this.
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Do you love your brothers? There's a wide range of brothers there.
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Do you love your neighbor? Do you love your mother and father? How do you make it really hit it? Do you love your wife? Do you love your husband? Are you contentious to one another? You know, your closest neighbor in the home is your husband and wife.
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You better hope if you're mistreating that person, that ain't one of God's people.
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Hey, promises of Edom's are good for promises today.
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That's all I'd ask you today.
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Do you have a grudge against a brother or sister? When I say that, let me just make it blanket.
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Against anyone.
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Do you got a grudge against anybody? Why? Self-motivated? Self-indulgent? You understand Esau had, to a certain degree, a little bit reason to be upset.
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He was tricked.
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His dad was tricked.
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All right, let's...
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Yes.
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But once the blessing was over, his responsibility was to submit to that which God had decreed.
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And he was unwilling.
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So if you're holding a grudge against someone today, mistreating someone for something they have done to you, today is the day of repentance.
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Wipe it clean.
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Do not let a spirit of bitterness well up inside of you because it will lead to unbelief.
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You know what happens when we hold a grudge or bitterness towards somebody? We think that we can figure it out better than God.
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That's what it is.
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We think that we can handle the situation better than God.
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Look, I'm not saying that people aren't grievously hurt.
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I'm not saying that people aren't hurt in such a way that forgiveness and reconciliation ain't tough.
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Yeah, it can be very tough.
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But the responsibility of the believer is to love and be reconciled to their brother, sister, husband, wife, mom, dad, boy, girl, kid, whatever.
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Whatever category.
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Young, old, whatever category you fall in.
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That's the responsibility of the believer.
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If you're not a believer here today and you're hearing the sound of my voice, waiting for it to stop, I want you to know that you right now are an enemy of God.
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Don't take my word for it.
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That's what God said.
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It says, you were born an enemy of God.
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Little, old, tiny babies coming to the world.
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They all look cute and cuddly and all that.
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But dude, they got little horns in their heart looking like little devils.
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They're coming to the world enemies of God.
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They are enemies.
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Man, what age are they not an enemy? The point that they come to faith in Christ and they're reconciled to a holy God through the precious blood of Jesus Christ.
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That's when.
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So if you're here today and you have not trusted fully in the finished work of Christ, meaning you have turned from unbelief to belief, meaning I'm turning from going my own way, trusting in my own stuff, my own sense of morality, doing my own thing, and now I'm going to turn to faith in Christ and put all of my faith and trust in Him.
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Man, if you have not done that, today is the day of salvation.
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You don't know if you get another breath.
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Remember, we already said at the beginning of this sermon, that's haughty to think that you've got another day.
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Just get out on the expressway, go as fast as you want, and count how many of them on the side of the road that says so-and-so here, so-and-so here, so-and-so here, died memorial after memorial after memorial after memorial or somebody's family member in a split second, no time to prepare, and forever stepped off into eternity.
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I don't know what the fate of those people are, but I tell you what, if you're here today without Christ and that happens to you, and you believe in the Lord Jesus Christ today, you will stand before the King of kings and the Lord of lords and you will be acquitted of your sins.
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That's what would happen.
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So as we prepare our hearts for the time of the table, examine your heart.
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See if there's any bitterness within you, any grudge that you're holding against someone.
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If so, let that plate pass.
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Let the plate pass.
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Jesus said, before you go to the altar, if you have something, your brother has ought against you.
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He didn't say if you got ought against somebody.
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It says if you know that your brother has something against you, you go to them and make it right.
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Who's the responsibility on? You.
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You.
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Let it pass today.
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I would rather see that plate come back with just as much in it and knowing that there's reconciliation that's got to be taking place before you do it than to see every piece of bread and every cup drank.
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Because that means you've got something more important than taking that table today and that's making it right with your brother or sister.
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I'm going to pray and the men are going to come forward and then we'll take up the table.
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Most gracious Heavenly Father, thank you for the prophet Obadiah who sits in time and obscurity.
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And some of us at times forget the book's even there.
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Father, thank you for his faithfulness to proclaim the judgment against the enemies of you and the enemies of your people.
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And thank you, Father, for the promises that you gave at the end of the book to your covenant people to promise them that there is coming a day when there will be back in our land and that land for the new covenant believers, the new heavens and the new earth, there will be no more suffering, no more pain, no more tears.
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And we will forever be in the presence of the King of kings and the Lord of lords and we will have new hearts and new minds that will be perfect.
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Father, as we prepare our hearts for the time to take the table, Father, I pray that men and women would examine their hearts, that they would search their hearts to see if there be any unclean way in them.
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Father, it was very clear, Apostle Paul said that some are sick, some are weak, some have even gone asleep, meaning dead, because of taking the table in an unworthy way.
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Father, I pray today that as we do it, that people would do it with clean hearts, with clean conscience, and it would be done in an act of worship towards you, in Christ's name.
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Amen.