Winning Stupid Prizes

All right, we're gonna say a quick prayer Lord Jesus again as we open up your word

We ask that you would send your spirit open our hearts and our minds So that we may rightly understand what your word teaches so that we may believe correctly

So that we may walk according to your will and according to your ways to the glory of your holy name

We ask in Jesus name. Amen All right last week. We are we're working our way through 1st

Samuel chapter 14 and we got partway through the story of Jonathan and Saul and the children of Israel in this encounter with the

Philistines it begins with that great almost Braveheart esque story of Jonathan and his armor -bearer taking on the whole army of the

Philistines because God had given them into their hands and It was just epic. I mean you can almost see the purple face paint and you know, never mind

But anyway, you get the idea, but while while that battle was going on that Jonathan began and With the

Lord's help really the Lord fighting the battle for them. The Philistines began slaying each other there was all kinds of confusion in the in the camp of Israel and King Saul Gave a command which was a rash thing to do the basically said any man who eats anything

Until we're done That person is going to be under a curse Makes perfect sense

No, it actually makes no sense at all because you know being a soldier even in today's modern world is quite a

Physical activity and your troops if they are famished they are not capable of doing well and so we're gonna pick up as the story continues and We're gonna see what happens here

We're gonna go at verse 24 for Samuel 14 24. The men of Israel had been hard -pressed that day

So Saul had laid an oath on the people saying curse be the man who eats food until it is evening

And I'm avenged on my enemies So none of the people had tasted food now when all the people came to the forest behold there was honey on the ground

And when the people entered the forest behold the honey was dropping But no one put his hand to his mouth for the people feared at the oath, but Jonathan had not heard his father's charge the people

Regarding the people and the oath so he put out the tip of his staff that was in his hand dipped it in the honeycomb and Put his hand to his mouth and his eyes became bright

Then one of the people said your father strictly charged the people with an oath saying cursed be the man

Who eats food this day and the people were faint? Then John said

Jonathan said my father has troubled land See how my eyes have become bright because I tasted a little of the sunny how much better if the people had eaten

Freely today of the spoil of their enemies that they found for now the defeat among the

Philistines has Not been great. So you'll note here that Saul's rashness

By laying an oath on the people. This is similar if you would to when we as human beings create man -made laws

That Christians are bound to obey I mean, this is kind of a good way of thinking about it.

So in the time of medieval Catholicism There were rules that were put into place

Rules such as you cannot eat meat on Friday. That's that still applies today and If you know your

Roman Catholicism, then you'll know that this has in the past been enforced

With what threat is? It a mortal or a venial sin if you eat meat on Friday Mortal, it's a mortal sin

If you die with a mortal sin on your heart, do you go to heaven or hell? Not not you don't even go to purgatory in their system.

You go straight to hell So there you are eating a whopper char broiled double whopper with cheese and Pickles and lettuce and onions and Special sauce and it's

Friday afternoon and you're just oh This is the best thing ever. You think I like whoppers, by the way, and so As soon as you leave

Burger King after having enjoyed this whopper on a Friday You're walking across 32nd and you get hit by a bus and you die

Doesn't matter that you've had faith in Jesus Christ your entire life Jesus is gonna you're gonna stand before Jesus and he goes.

Yeah, I see you were baptized I see you trusted me for the forgiveness of your sins Whoa, you ate a whopper five minutes before you died on a

Friday and he says I never knew you Like a fire for you.

Does that seem ridiculous? It does doesn't it is there any rule in the

Mosaic Covenant that says that if a soldier fights During a battle and then takes a break and has something to eat that God is going to curse him

Nope, totally man -made rule. And so you'll note that we human beings also act very irrationally

All right by invoking invoking a curse upon the person who ate this food

That now he's he's literally, you know, and you know, this curse is invoking death and for what what's the principle at stake?

What commandment is being broken so then go? Well, maybe it's the fourth commandment

But is it this was the sin of omission not a sin of commission on the part of Jonathan. He had no clue

That there was such a rule that said if I eat today, I'm under a curse no rule no concept at all

So we're gonna see here that Saul has really kind of plummeted

He's really plummeted as far as his overall character Not only is he does he offer sacrifices which he is not permitted to do within his office

Now he's he's adding to the Torah He's adding to the law and basically adding in a sense

You know There's these rash without any thinking whatsoever man -made rules with the threat of death attached to it

This is nonsense But that's how our human nature is Have you ever

I mean if you've heard stories of people who live in very aggressive

Muslim countries today maybe Pakistan Do they write?

Sane rational laws as it pertains to Christians It seems like from day to day you have no idea what rules are gonna be put in place

Which ones are gonna disappear or whatever? It's like you're just from on a day -to -day basis

You just don't know what's coming down the pike That's the same kind of rationale that's going on here so Jonathan dipped the tip of his staff dipped in his honeycomb put in his mouth

He says John says that my father's troubled land See how my eyes had become bright because I tasted a little of this honey and see that's the thing

God Replenishes our strength through means and the means that he's chosen his food makes perfect sense.

So this law that Saul had made on the fly

Flies in the face of how God replenishes his people normally So Jonathan says how much better if the people had eaten freely of the spoil

Other enemies that they found for the defeat among the Philistines has not been great so now we see that because the soldiers are worn out and fatigued and our need to have

MREs in order to Resustain themselves, you know the battle that could have been even better More victorious was less victorious, but it gets worse they struck down the

Philistines that day from Michmash to Ajalan and the people were very faint the people pounced on the spoil took sheep and oxen and calves and Slaughtered them on the ground and the people ate them with the blood which they're forbidden to do

So this man -made law This rash command by Saul that is contrary to nature itself

Resulted in not only a you know a victory that wasn't so great it Resulted in people now sinning against a real command of God By eating food that has blood still in it which the

Jews of that time were forbidden to do So then they told Saul behold the people are sinning against Yahweh by eating with the blood

And he said you have dealt treacherously roll a great stone to me here Saul said disperse yourselves among the people and say to them

Let every man bring his ox or his sheep and slaughter them here and eat and do not sin against Yahweh by eating with the blood so every one of the people brought his ox with him that night and they slaughtered them there and Saul built an altar to Yahweh.

It was the first altar that he built to Yahweh So then Saul said let us go down after the

Philistines by night and plunder them until the morning light Let us not leave a man of them and they said do whatever seems good to you

But the priest said let us draw near to God here. So he decides he's gonna press the attack he's gonna do a nighttime attack now, this is in the days before infrared and The kind of weapon systems that we have today so that people can actually see into the night so a nighttime attack is kind of a rare thing in the ancient world and Obviously, he's thinking he needs to do this in order to kind of make up for his blunder with his rash

Stupid command with the oath attached to it. And so I know what let ever let all the guys

Have a little bit of food They won't get a full night's sleep we'll let them get a little bit of rest, but we're gonna we're gonna surprise the enemy with a nighttime attack and the priests

Said whoa, slow down there partner slow down We're gonna we got to check to see if God's gonna give us the victory

Now if you know your Mosaic Covenant that as part of the Mosaic Covenant the priests had

These things that were called the room and Thuman I'm familiar with these terms

The Oram and Thuman were not exactly sure how it worked But it because God instituted and it was part of the priestly garb that you can ask the high priest a question and the question will be going to God and the

Oram and Thuman Based upon how the colors worked with the stones The answer would come back either yes, no or no answer at all

Those are the three options kind of yes. No or God ain't talking to you So they're gonna ask

God should we press this attack against the Philistines by night? Should we do this and they're gonna use the

Oram and Thuman for the purposes of that By the way, if you know your Mormon history Joseph Smith claims to have had the

Oram and Thuman you familiar with this So the way that the story goes the Book of Mormon was written down on golden plates that were hidden hidden in the

Hill Cumorah in New York and the angel Moroni helped Joseph Smith find these golden plates and he found them and ran home with them

Gold plates are pretty tough to run with but anyway, because they're pretty heavy, but you know So he was given a special ability

Apparently these the the Oram and Thuman were like peeper stones and he put them into his hat and he claims that he can translate the

Reformed Egyptian Hieroglyphics which apparently the Book of Mormon was originally written in and he would stick his face into the hat and he can magically see through the hat and the

Reformed Egyptian hieroglyphics would translate into English and then he would Dictate to a person behind a curtain because the person on the other side of the curtain weren't wasn't allowed to see the actual golden tablets and so That sound like it's hotel to you.

It should what when the book when the Mormons talk about the Oram and Thuman just Chalk that up to like the legend of Paul Bunyan, you know, it's it's out.

It's out there Oh Paul is real you

Minnesotans. You're so silly. Oh, that's funny. Okay Hey Paul Paul Bunyan anyway, so then

Saul said let us go down after the Philistines by night plunder them until the morning Let us not leave a man of them and they said do whatever seems good to you

But the priest said let us draw near to God here and Saul inquired of God Shall I go down after the

Philistines? Will you give them into the hand of Israel, but he did not answer him at that day

So he used Urman Thuman and it came back nothing So Saul said come here all you leaders of the people and know and see this sin has arisen today so he's

Detected that a sin has occurred and that this is the reason why God has turned his face from him and is not answering his

Question so as at for as Yahweh lives who saves Israel though it be in Jonathan my son

He shall surely die And Jonathan said I shall not die and stop calling me.

Surely. So I Just love that joke He shall surely die But there was not a man among the people who answered him and then he said to all

Israel you shall be on one side I and Jonathan my son will be on the other side and the people said to Saul do it seems good to you

Because they know what happened, right? Therefore Saul said Oh Yahweh God of Israel.

Why have you not answered your servant this day? If this guilt is in me or in Jonathan my son

Oh Yahweh God of Israel give room But if this guilt is in your people

Israel give Thuman Jonathan Saul were taken but the people escaped then

Saul said cast the lot between me and my son Jonathan and Jonathan was taken

So God ratted out Jonathan. So then Saul said to Jonathan. Tell me what you have done

Jonathan told him I tasted a little honey with the tip of the staff that was in my hand

Here I am. I'll die. No problem. Go ahead. Kill me. Does that sound like a sin worthy of death to you?

No, Saul said God do so to me and more also you shall surely die

Jonathan What a terrible rule what a terrible consequence for what and remember who started the battle?

Jonathan and his armor -bearer did right? So then the people said to Saul then you can almost hear the anger and the rage shall

Jonathan die Who has worked this great salvation in Israel? far from it as Yahweh lives there shall not one hair of his head fall to the ground for he has worked with God this day so the people ransomed

Pada Jonathan so that he did not die now It's important to note here that the fact that they ransomed

Jonathan hints at but not explicitly So we can't push too hard on it But it hints at the possibility that there was a substitute that died in Jonathan's place

Probably an animal like a sin sacrifice or something like that. You know, that's how ransoming took place

So there's a real possibility here that even Jonathan had to have a substitute so that he didn't have to die here

But something did so a sacrificial animal of one type or another and you'll note up above in the context

It makes it clear that there was an altar built to the Lord So kind of fascinating So then

Saul went up from pursuing the Philistines the Philistines went to their own place When Saul had taken the kingship to over Israel he fought against all his enemies on every side against Moab against the

Ammonites against Edom against the kings of Zobah and Against the Philistines wherever he turned he routed them

And he did valiantly instruct the Amalekites and delivered Israel out of the hands of those who plundered him

So this little segue right here It's kind of like the highlight reel, you know

This is the highlight montage of the mighty things that Saul does so he did valiantly

Zobah went what a great name by the way, and he did valiantly struck the Amalekites delivered

Israel in the hands of those who plundered them Now the sons of Saul were Jonathan Ish V Malki Shua the names of his two daughters were these the name of the firstborn was

Mirab and the name of the younger Michal and the name of Saul's wife aha

No, I'm the daughter of aha Maaz and the name of the commander of his army was Abner the son of Nir Saul's uncle

Kish was the father of Saul and Nir the father of Abner was the son of Abiel There was hard fighting against the

Philistines all the days of Saul and when Saul saw any strong man or any valiant man

He attached him to himself Now comes

The kind of final plunge now you remember that When Saul had offered sacrifices, which he was not permitted to do as king that God had already rejected him as king

Remember that that had already happened. And so in the similar way that there's kind of a multi -step process in Saul's ascent

There's also a little bit of a multi -step process in his descent in his total rejection so already he is acted in a way that he's not permitted as king of Israel and God has already rejected him and now the rejection is going to be complete if you would with this next story

And so it's kind of fascinating what Saul doesn't do along the way Repent, that's the interesting thing

So for Sam of 15 Samuel said to Saul Yahweh sent me to anoint you king over his people

Israel Now therefore listen to the words of Yahweh thus says Yahweh of hosts

Yahweh Saba oath Saba here is means armies. So Yahweh of armies

I Have noted what Amalek did to Israel in opposing them on the way

When they came up out of Egypt now go strike Amalek and devote to destruction all that they have

Do not spare them but kill both man and woman child and infant ox and sheep camel and donkey devote to total destruction

This is an act of judgment now It's important to note here that in the Old Testament things are in type and shadow in the

New Testament. You see the fulfillment Jesus is prophet. He's priest. He's king when

Jesus comes to judge the living and the dead And he devotes all of the earth to destruction

Which office is he really acting in King?

This is kingly office So note here that God has given an explicit command and it's a command of judgment

God has judged these people and he's decided that their sin has reached the level where he says enough is enough and To make an example of them as an example of God's judgment against those who persist in sin and unbelief

You King Saul are to utterly destroy them wipe them off the face of the earth

This is God's command and his instrument for it is King Saul who technically should be acting in type and shadow

To Christ so he's gonna fall way short though way short

So we read so Saul summoned the people numbered them in tell

I am 200 ,000 men on foot 10 ,000 men of Judah and Saul came to the city of Amalek and lay in wait in the valley

Then Saul said to the Kenites go depart go down from among the Amalekites lest I destroy you with them

For you showed kindness to all the people of Israel when they came up out of Egypt So the

Kenites departed from among the Amalekites and Saul defeated the Amalekites from Havilah as far as sure

Which is east of Egypt and he took a gag the king of the Amalekites alive whoops

Not supposed to do that and he devoted to destruction all the people with the edge of the sword but Saul and the people spared a gag and the best of the sheep and of the oxen and of the fatted calves and the lambs and all that was good

And would not utterly destroy them all that was despised and worthless They devoted to destruction

Was that what God said to do? Nope, so we've got a problem here

So the word of Yahweh came to Samuel important words here because what's gonna follow?

Is not Samuel's opinion. It's gonna be God's opinion God's opinion of Saul and what

Saul has done and We're gonna hear kind of fascinating words. God says

I regret that I have made Saul king For he has turned back from following me and has not performed my commandments

That same word for regret by the way shows up in Genesis chapter 6.

It's not whom That same word shows up in Genesis chapter 6 when it says of God that he regretted

That he had made man on the earth You'll note the impact that our sin has on God and although he knows the end from the beginning

It still grieves him to his core So God regrets that he made Saul king

He's turned back from following him not performing his commandments and Samuel was angry and he cried to Yahweh all

Night Samuel rose early to meet Saul in the morning and it was told

Samuel Saul came to Carmel and behold, he set up a monument for himself and turned and passed on and went down to Gilgal and Samuel came to Saul and Saul said to him

Blessed be you to Yahweh. I Have performed the commandment of Yahweh Really So Saul thinks he's done it

So Samuel said What then is this bleeding of sheep in my ears and the lowing of oxen that I hear he didn't kill him

Uh -huh. Now remember Samuel has had a conversation with God. So Saul said

They have brought them from the Amalekites The people spared the best of the sheep and the oxen

I know to sacrifice to Yahweh your God Yeah, yeah, that's the ticket.

Yeah to sacrifice. Yeah. Yeah, that's what we're gonna do. We're gonna sacrifice those good sheep and stuff.

Yeah He's lying through his teeth and He's shifting blame notice the deflecting

He's confronted with his sin the buck stops where at the top and When confronted with his sin, he says they it was them

They passed they are the ones who did it. They are the ones Uh -huh, and not only that Do you shift blame he even came up with a pious explanation for their shameful or disobedient behaviors because they were gonna sacrifice

The rest we've devoted to destruction Samuel said to Saul stop Stop, I will tell you what

Yahweh said to me this night and he said to them speak Samuel said though you are little in your own eyes

Are you not the head of the tribes of Israel? Yahweh anointed you king over Israel and Yahweh sent you on a mission and said go devote to destruction the sinners the

Amalekites and fight against them until they are consumed Why then did you not obey the voice of Yahweh?

I remember He just said that Yahweh is the one who talked to him, right? so Samuel's not giving his opinion

He's he's basically revealing to him what the Lord told him and then he asked the question

Why did you not obey the voice of the Lord? Why did you pounce on the spoil and do what was evil in the sight? of Yahweh I have obeyed the voice of Yahweh He says

I have gone on the mission in which the Lord sent me. I have brought Agag the king of Amalek Which is not what he was supposed to do and I have devoted the

Amalekites to destruction, but the people people they took of the spoil the sheep and the oxen the

Best of the things devoted to destruction to sacrifice to Yahweh your God and Gilgal and Samuel said

Has Yahweh as great as a light and burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the

Lord? behold to obey is better than sacrifice and to listen then the fat of Rams and This is one of the more most important sentences in all of Scripture verse 23

Rebellion is as the sin of divination and the Hebrew word for divination

Kasem Literally, you can translate that as witchcraft Rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft presumption is as Iniquity and idolatry so note we have rebellion and presumption

All in Saul now think of Jonathan for a minute.

I think back was Jonathan presumptuous regarding attacking the Philistines No, not at all.

He was the exact opposite of presumptuous He did not act unless he had a sure word from God that he knew that God was going to give him the victory

Saul had a clear word from God and He just stopped listening to it and just presumed a whole bunch of stuff and in the process.

He was rebellious and so rebellion and iniquity or rebellion and presumption are like witchcraft and Idolatry and they really are they really are and I want you to think about this in the book of second

Thessalonians It talks about in the last days that there will be a great rebellion against God actually within the church

It's we call it the great apostasy. You've heard the prophecies regarding the great apostasy That within the very church itself the visible church there would be a flat -out rebellion against God in his own church and Rebellion is like what?

Witchcraft divination and I think it's not Not a coincidence that the form in which the apostasy in our days has taken shape

Sounds a lot like witchcraft and divination with word curses and We're just nonsense crazy things like this and Oh the presumption presumption of it all and so at the very core then

Saul is Rebellious and he's presumptuous and we see it in spades in the two stories that we just read about him

So God's is now spoken his judgment rebellion is as the sin of divination and that's

Saul's sin Presumption is as the iniquity as an equity and idolatry again.

We see this in Saul in spades because you have rejected the word of Yahweh he has also rejected you from being king and is that not always at the heart a rejection of God's Word Gets you in all kinds of trouble all kinds you think about What happened to the mainline denominations?

Where did their rebellion against God start because we see it in our day now where you have church bodies entire church bodies ordaining and penance and homosexuals and All kinds of nonsense that goes along with it, right?

Well, that's where it is today Where did it all start though go back in time? Where did it start?

19th century what higher criticism her whole point of higher criticism was what?

To attack the authority of Scripture To deny that it is an inspired book to make it a book just that's basically mere human stories

That doesn't have authority or anything to say that's binding on us in our belief in our actions today.

So Where we are now Began with a rejection of God's Word in Paul in Saul's life.

We see it all happening in the course of his Brief stint as king at this point.

He's rejected the Word of the Lord He's not attentive to it doesn't believe it doesn't obey it and so as a result of this

God has rejected him from being king and You'd think at this point he might get the picture, right?

so Saul said to Samuel I Have sinned for I have transgressed the commandment of Yahweh and your words if He had stopped there

We would be dealing with a confession, but he doesn't stop there

Because I feared the people and I obeyed their voice Who is he blaming? Them I sinned but it's their fault

Now therefore, please pardon my sin and return with me that I may bow before Yahweh What was his sin exactly that he listened to the people you see this is a convoluted confession

What's exactly are you supposed to be forgiven for so Sam has said to Saul I? I Will not return with you

You have rejected the Word of Yahweh And Yahweh has rejected you from being king over Israel as Samuel turned to go away

Saul sees the skirt of his robe and a tour Samuel said to him Yahweh has torn the kingdom of Israel from you this day and has given it to a neighbor of yours

Who's better than you and also the glory of Israel will not lie or? Have regret for he is not a man that he should have regret

Then they said I have sinned yet honor me now before the elders of my people and before Israel and return with me

Then I may bow before Yahweh your God So Samuel turned back after Saul and Saul bowed before the

Lord. So notice he wants to put on pretenses for the sake of Himself Isn't that weird?

He doesn't want everyone to know what's going on here So Sam has said bring here to me Agag the king of the

Amalekites Agag came to him cheerfully

Agag said surely the bitterness of death is past You can almost see him saying that smugly, right?

So Samuel said as your sword has made women childless So shall your mother be childless among women

Samuel hacked Agag to pieces before Yahweh and Gilgal and everyone's dead

Wow, that's the king's job not the prophets job but I digress

So we see then here that kind of summarizing where we've come to at this point

When we're studying the concept of kingdom This has been set up in such a way so that we can really contrast the kingdom

That men look for humanity looks for and the kingdom that God brings

Saul Represented everything that we would ever want as sinful human beings in a king tall handsome rich and Despite the fact at the beginning of his reign

He is given the Holy Spirit and given a new heart He doesn't attend to the

Word of God Continue to believe in it and act on it He rejects it and this ultimately has him spiraling out of control

Spiraling out of control first by offering sacrifices, which he's not permitted to sacrifice and then by him literally straight up rebelling against God By not devoting to destruction that you the

Amalekites and then you also see in there his presumption his presumption regarding his

Stupid rule about nobody eating or whatever and we see all of this in spades in Saul and here's the sad part

This is what we see in ourselves and I will even argue we see this in our very leadership in our own country locally

State and nationally and we see it every generation and So God has said

I'm gonna reject you and God is now going to raise up a king after his own heart

God is going to put a different man on the throne and he's going to do so in a way

That's very fascinating because notice although God has rejected Saul. You're gonna know it's gonna be a while a

Long while before Saul actually dies and So now we're gonna have this awkward thing going on We're going to have

King David Who's going to be the anointed King of Israel? Not yet reigning while there is still the previous king in place

Tell me that's not an awkward situation and Literally King David for the whole beginning part of his story is going to be in dire danger

From the other King. Can you start to see how this typology is working out here, right?

So we're gonna have two conflicting kingdoms but both kingdoms have been established by God and One is trying desperately to destroy the other

The other is trying desperately to flee the other while not playing by the others rules

It's kind of an interesting motif if you think about it So something that we have to kind of flesh out as we you know get into the story

But before we get into David I think I'm gonna actually stop there because this is a logical stopping place and we'll ask if there's any questions

Thus far regarding the kingdom or anything that we've read in the story of Saul up to this point

Yeah, yeah, that's an interesting application hadn't considered that but You'll note that When you really start to tease out this idea of kingdom and I would even point you to today's gospel text isn't it fascinating that the kingdom of heaven is like a

Man who sowed good seed in the field and Jesus says the field is the world Is that interesting?

So in our day we live in a day when people confuse The left -hand kingdom.

This is my left. This is your left the left -hand kingdom with the right -hand kingdom and They push the two together and then over and again, you know

Christians and pastors and leaders spend all their time focusing in on politics and Anointing political leaders and things like this nature, which is weird

This is really weird, you know and nowadays some of the most dubious Heretical characters are the ones who have the president's ear which is again just strange

He asked me. I don't know if that answers your question, but man, you know Yeah Yeah Did you see the big there was a flu is it last week or the week before the photograph of Trump praying with like Rodney Howard Brown and all of these

Televangelists and somebody posted on the internet and I said were they trying to steal his wallet, you know My question, but that's a different story altogether

Any other questions as it relates to kingdom might be Janet. I'm gonna ask you a question I mean, we've been kind of working through this now for a few weeks is

The concept of the kingdom of God any clearer than it was? six weeks ago

All right, that's that's progress It's okay. That's progress. That's progress because we we've only told a portion of the story here at this point

But it's starting to come into its so it's like a polarity We've snapped the photograph and maybe you can see some blurry figures in there good

That's where we're supposed to be right right now, by the way Okay similar

Yeah, and so you'll notice this the two -track theme motif in Scripture all the time the kingdom of God versus the kingdoms of the earth and in the in that when we were reading in Genesis and in Exodus, how does that then play out?

Exited in Exodus. It's Egypt that kind of is the stand -in for the world's way of doing government

Now that we're in Israel now Saul is the stand -in for the world's government but after King David and with the decline of the monarchy into idolatry and Eventually, you know

Nebuchadnezzar coming and sacking Jerusalem What ends up happening is the motif changes altogether and now moving forward

Babylon is always That you know pictured as that Worldly system if you would and what's fascinating about that then it's the

Babylon motif And that is carried over then into the book of Revelation Right the big system of the world that opposes the

Saints and Martyrs them is known as mystery Babylon. Well now here's the funny thing

Okay Now they couldn't use Rome but you know why they couldn't use Rome and they had to use that code talk

Because if they had named Rome Explicitly in the book of Revelation. Oh, they would have gotten in a lot of trouble so part of the part of the kind of the key to understanding the book of Revelation is

That for the reader who's reading it at that time the time it's written There's code talk in there to help them bear up under the persecution.

They're facing by the Romans But it's obscured in talk about Babylon That make sense

So the and the Roman system is Kind of the system now moving forward if you know the prophecy of Daniel with the big statue

Well, you know that with the head of gold and silver and then bronze and iron and then clay and iron mixed together, right?

That the you know that Rome is typified then in the iron and that the the kingdoms of the earth prior to the return of Christ are

Partly clay and partly iron and so you kind of get the idea here that the Roman system is the one that kind of is

Enduring but has kind of become frail and brittle and broken apart, which is kind of where we're at today

You know all of the all of the democracies the Western democracies are Roman in their approach in the worldly system in the you know in their jurisprudence and even in their worldview

But it's been it's really been broken down in his bitter and not bitter but brittle and you know kind of really you know

I'm saying so yeah, but in the book of Revelation Babylon is kind of the stand -in for Rome Which is weird but we as Christians as we read the book then we see the two tracks and You know where Christ?

Distinguishes himself from the world where he says the rulers of this age Lord themselves over others, but not so with you

The greatest among you will be your slave You see everything is backwards It's whatever the however the world's values are the the values of the kingdom of heaven are the exact inverse opposite The exalted are the greatest in the world system in the kingdom of God It's the humble the servant the slave the lowliest and so it's all kind of important stuff

And we're gonna see these themes then playing out in the conflict between Saul and David and You can even begin to see kind of themes of persecution of the church and stuff like that You know and there's this pursuing motif which also shows up in the book of Revelation as well

Yeah Uh -huh

Okay, yeah, just hang on a second let me ring God real quick. Hey God. Yeah got a tough one here.

Yeah Let me answer it this way I cannot give you a definitive answer as to why

God has chosen to do what he's doing in the world geopolitically when it comes to something as as Horrifyingly awful as Islam.

I just I don't have an answer to it. Is it within the realm of a biblical? Possibility that in part what we're seeing is

God's judgment against Western civilizations rebellion against the Word of God that may actually be possible and I would have to go to biblical text to say that we've seen

God act in this way in the past therefore it is within the realm of possibility that God is judging us for our rejecting of his word and Persecuting of his

Christians you do you persist like that and God says fine. I'm gonna give you over to something else You didn't you didn't like you didn't like me.

You ain't gonna like Allah. Trust me So that's within the realm of possibility. Can I say that that's definitively happening?

No, I can't I actually can't I can't say this that the King of Kings and Lord of Lords is

Working all of the stuff that's happening geopolitically Because there is no there is no government on earth that has not been established by him

So and sometimes God establishes governments for the judgment of the wickedness of the people in a territory sometimes he causes

Governments to arise that are Difficult to deal with for the purpose of humbling them and creating the good soil that's needed for the gospel to grow

So I would say this it's like so way above my pay grade You know,

I'm in sales, you know, he you know, I'm in sales and marketing He's in management, so I can't give you a definitive answer on that But I would say we can we can look at scripture and see how

God has acted in the past and say that this is within the realm of possibility, but I do not recommend buying a sandwich board and Going and let you know and standing out on the streets of Grand Forks and saying

God has sent Islam here to judge us For our sin repent that that may not be correct You know, that may not be the right way of looking at it.

So Okay There's there's something in your question that's loaded and I have to unload it

So the question was what happens to all those innocent people over there who have not heard the word

We're gonna unpack the word innocent and we're gonna take that one away We're all born dead and trespasses and sins.

None of us are innocent that's the scary part as a result of this all of us are liable to the judgment of God and Salvation comes through the means of grace

Now we're now touching on the crux the oligarch in the sense that how how can we understand

God as being just when there are people literally in parts of the world that the gospel has not reached and you know they have not heard and the reality is this is that their

Judgment is not because of their lack of hearing the gospel. Their judgment is because of their active rebellion against God So we've got to keep those two separate if you would and so when it comes to the mystery of God's sovereignty as To the speed at which the gospel reaches different people groups again

That's beyond my ability to speculate or give you an answer to And I would come back to what the

Apostle Paul says and that is in Romans chapter 10. How are they going to hear? Unless somebody preaches, how are they somebody to preach unless somebody is sent?

And so the church has been tasked with the job of making disciples of all nations, which means it's our responsibility to Preach the word raise up disciples send people out so the gospel can can can reach to the ends of the earth

So that that's how I would put it It's not a satisfactory answer, but we have to stay within the limits that we've been given.

Does that make sense? So No, it's it's the whole situation on earth is quite unsatisfactory.

It's unsatisfactory within myself So yeah, all right any other questions?