Whitten Q & A - Ep. 2

Whitten Baptist Church

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This is our second on Saturdays, it's our second in looking at different questions that people have asked via text message or Facebook messenger or so on and so forth and we're going to take these questions and we're going to answer them.

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Let me first introduce, I have two guests that I have flown in special from Southern Theological Seminary, actually no, this is

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Josiah Shipley and this is Jeremiah Shipley and they are the brains of the operation,

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I'm just obviously the good looks. So we are going to answer these questions today and hopefully this will become something that will be ongoing from week to week,

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I really think it will be beneficial and one of the things that I really would like to do is get more of God's people on here instead of the pastor,

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I'm just a big believer in turning loose the people of God and really letting

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God's spirit through their gift skills and talents utilize His tools and get

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Him the glory. So that's what we're going to do today, now I'm going to read both questions of what we're going to do and then we're, well actually first what we're going to do is we're going to pray and then we're going to read the questions and then we're going to go right into our discussion, okay?

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So I'm going to ask Jeremiah to lead us in prayer and guys remember, don't just listen to Jeremiah, let the church of God, anywhere you're watching right now, let us pray in one accord for God to be glorified and His will to be done.

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Lord we come to you now, we pray Lord for your spirit to be with us, on us and in us

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God. We pray for our people Lord, not just of this church but of this country

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God, Lord help it bring us to repentance God, bring conviction upon us, let us be a nation of repentance and conviction

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God. Lord during these times, let us not have a spirit of fear, but Lord as you say in your word have a spirit of sound mind.

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Lord we love you and we praise you in all things, in your name I pray, amen. Amen. Well, I tell you we have been inundated with different questions, but going in order that we received them,

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I just wanted to read them both to you. We're going to try to do two tonight and I think we'll be able to do two, but I really like this first question.

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I like it a lot and if we have time we'll do three, but this first question says this and I'll read to you.

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It says, this is a question about God's justice. Was God's justice just to drown the children of the world in the flood for the actions of their parents?

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Was it just to kill all of the first born children of Egypt because their king was stubborn i .e.

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Pharaoh? And this kind of puts us in a weird position because now we must make one of two conclusions.

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Is it unjust to punish children for their parents' crimes, thus God is unjust?

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Or two, is it just to punish children for their parents' crimes and by not doing so we are unjust and should be killing the children of those who commit sin against God?

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And I like the way it was worded because from the concept of justice, man's understanding of justice, it is an either or situation.

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But I'm going to let these gentlemen talk about it and you understand the question as it's written?

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Okay. Well let's listen to them and let's see what they have to say. Very fair question, one that every true believer should ask at some point and remember guys, there is nothing wrong with questioning the

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Bible so long as you understand what it means to question. When we say we question the Bible, we don't mean that we doubt.

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When we say we question the Bible, we mean when we read it, we have questions. And to pretend that you don't is dishonest.

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So I love that when people ask questions like this. Now, you know, it's funny, from an atheist standpoint, you'll hear people say something like, why doesn't

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God put an end to evil, right? And so we have the

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Canaanites sacrificing their children to the god Molech. So God kills the Canaanites to stop it and then the atheists will complain, well, why does

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God kill people even though he stopped it? And they'll say, well, why doesn't God just change their hearts?

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So in scripture when he does that, they say, well, why is he messing with their free will? They just want a way to get

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God in trouble. But I'm assuming that this question is being asked by a believer who wants a genuine answer to the question.

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So let's start with this premise. What is justice, right?

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What is justice? God's justice is God being a judge, being just to judge.

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Well, the Bible tells us that all mankind, all mankind is sinful. Now, if a judge in today's time never gave justice, never punished, if you will, people who broke the law, we would say that's a bad judge.

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So God is the judge of the universe and he never punishes sin, wouldn't he be a bad judge?

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Now, I've heard some Christians, unfortunately, try to grind this question by saying that the flood and the plagues of Egypt are allegorical, that they didn't really happen and that, that's not what we believe here.

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Absolutely. And we believe that that is the word of God. It tells of real events in history by 40 -something different writers with one author, and that's the

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Holy Spirit. So we believe that really happened. When the person asked about the flood, Genesis 6, 7, 8, or the plagues of Egypt and the early parts of Exodus, we believe that did happen.

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And the question, and I'll rephrase it and I'll let other people jump in, but the question was one, basically why did

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God drown the world, why did he kill the firstborn in Egypt, how does that make him just, and how are we to take that, how are we to respond with that?

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Doesn't that put us in a weird position of how are we supposed to handle that, right? So first two things

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I want to lay out, and then I'll let Jermiah talk, is one, the whole world has fallen.

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When Adam sinned, God told Adam, the ground is cursed because of you.

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We said this last Wednesday, you hear a Christian say, I feel as low as dirt, well actually you're lower than dirt.

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You're lower than dirt. Dirt never disobeyed. The dirt did what God told it to do, we didn't.

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Dirt never disobeyed. Right, yeah. Guys, let's just be real with the situation.

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The reason the earth is cursed, the reason that animals die is because of human sin.

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That's correct. We live in a fallen world. So when the people in the crowds reach out to Jesus and say,

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Jesus, did you hear about the Galileans who Pilate mixed their blood in with the sacrifices, and Jesus says, yeah, did you hear about the

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Tower of Shilom, this is Luke 13, the Tower of Shilom that fell and killed 18 people. Most of the world would say that was a freak accident, killed 18 people.

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Jesus said, do you think you're better than these Galileans? Yeah. And I tell you, unless you repent, you will all perish as well.

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We live in a fallen world, so the natural state of things is sin, death, and destruction.

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That's the natural state of things. The question isn't, why do people go to hell when they die, why do people get sick, that's not the question.

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The real question is, why is the whole planet not in hell right now? That's right. You don't deserve hell when you die, people.

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You deserve hell right now. Me, Jeremiah, everybody, we deserve hell right now. The fact that anyone on this planet is taking breath is by the mercy of God.

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Remember, Genesis chapter 6 says this, it says the entire world, the entire world turned away from God save one man,

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Noah. Why did eight people get on the boat? Because of mercy. Where sin abounds, grace abounds even more.

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I'll let Jeremiah speak to this point, but keep in mind, there are consequences to our sins. Yes. And our consequences to our sin do affect those around us, that is true.

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But if the consequences of our sins can affect those around us, but where sin abounds, grace abounds even more, how much more can a blessing, can a good word, can a good work bless those around us?

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Amen. Go ahead, Jeremiah. It's important to understand the significance of what you just said.

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Having the premise that your sin does not just affect you.

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So the way I like to put it is, all sin is equal, and that all sin will send you to hell.

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Right. However, all sin is not equal in its earthly, right now, effect.

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Physical consequence, that's exactly right. The consequences of sin are not all equal. Right. If you steal a piece of gum from the store, you might get a misdemeanor citation.

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You commit murder, you might be in there for life. It's a different consequence. And by God's law, both are guilty of eternal punishment.

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Right. But by man's physical repercussions, one causes greater damage in the earthly realm than the other one does.

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But, and the point of that is that the effects of sin are different. And so the effect of the

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Adamic sin, of the first sin that Adam had, was by far the greatest in its effect, because it cursed the universe.

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Wow. So here's an example. I've never thought of that before. Here's an example. Genesis 21, Ishmael is banished, and Hagar, remember, is banished from their family.

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Why? Because Abraham and Sarah didn't have faith. The consequences of their sin had ramifications for other people.

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Now, God was still with Ishmael. He found them at the bush. God was still with Ishmael.

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But the physical ramifications of Abraham's sin did affect others. It did affect others, right?

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When you are a leader, whether that be of a church or a country, when you're a leader, your decisions can affect others for the good or for evil, right?

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There are physical ramifications for it. But again, I think sometimes we get so used to God's mercy and grace that when

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He actually shows us His justice, we're not used to it, we say, that's unfair, when really that's the most fair thing.

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What is unfair is that I am breathing right now. That's unfair. God's justice requires a payment for my sin.

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And that's where Jesus steps in, which is why whoever calls on the name of the

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Lord will be saved. Saved from what? Saved from wrath, which is what we all deserve.

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But God, who is rich in mercy because of His unfailing love, made us alive even though we were dead in sin.

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I don't want to get too much into the second question, but as far as the judgment for your eternal destiny, you were judged a long time ago, and you were found guilty.

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Every one of us were. Now, I would say this, though. The question is a good question, and I'm not doubting it.

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However, I do believe that it has a false dichotomy in it. What do you mean? A false dichotomy means that it's saying, well, there's only two options, and that's not the case.

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Because the question was posed that either God is unjust for punishing children, or it is just to punish children by death.

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So either it's okay to punish babies by death for the sin of the parents, or God is an unjust person.

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But that is a false dichotomy. Here is something I learned this past year, and it shifted the perspective a little bit.

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God is outside of time. He is not in the mortal, linear time frame that we are in.

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And also, you have to understand this. We are spirit and soul, okay? We're not flesh and blood.

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You know, if someone gets their legs blown off, are they 50 % less of them? No. You know, if I cut my arm off,

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I'm not less of Jeremiah, I'm just, part of me is gone. Part of the body is gone. So the point is that we're spirit.

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Our spirits never actually die. You go to heaven, you go to hell, you're still alive, because your spirit does not cease to exist.

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Okay, so that was a long thing to come to this. To God, you don't die.

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We say we die. But to God, you're just moving positions. You're just moving from earth to heaven.

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And so I say that to say this. God is just, and He is sovereign, to bring

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His child home whenever He chooses. When God decides that this is the time, then that's

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His time. And it's not a death, it's not a murder, it's not a killing from the perspective of an outside of time sovereign

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God. It's your time to come home, my son. You know, the disciples kind of asked this same question when there was a blind man on the street, and it was like they were taking bets on the side of the street.

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John chapter 9. Yeah, Jesus said to Obed, is that guy blind because of his sin or his parents? Jesus kind of scoffed at him and said neither.

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One of those for the false dichotomy. Right. He said, he's not blind because of the sin of his parents. Now listen, listen to Jesus' answer, way more than you listen to any of ours.

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Jesus said, that guy is not blind directly because of the sin of his parents, he's not blind directly because of his sin.

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He's blind in this fallen world, so that all of you can go watch Him and heal him. See God's glory.

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See God's glory. Well, go ahead. And so the way the question is framed is pretty much, you know, is

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God just to kill, even though I think that's an improper way of looking at it, or, and the other part of the question is talking about generational sin.

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That the sins of the Father pass down the sins of the Son, and in Deuteronomy chapter 5, it does say that in the iniquities will, the

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Lord will hold the iniquities of the third and fourth generation, but the grace and love He'll give to a thousand generations, right?

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Where sin abounds, grace abounds more. This is something that I personally believe.

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When you look at the Philistines, the wars between the Philistines and the Israelites, okay?

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The Israelites, it says the Israelites lost every single battle until they repented.

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And once they repented, victory came to them. So why do I say that?

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Well, what if they didn't repent? They would have kept losing. They would have kept dying. What if the next generation continued to be in unrepentance?

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They would have continued to lose. They would have continued, but once they repented, the

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Lord gave them victory. I ask and I wonder, it says to the third and fourth generation, what if the third generation had repented?

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There wouldn't have been a fourth one. People talk about family curses, when in reality that's just you continuing the same line of sin that your parents did, that you saw in your parents, you continue to do.

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So if you be the deciding factor, the stopper, the saying, hey, we're not going to do this anymore.

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My family will no longer be known of this sin. We will repent and come back to God.

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That will not be held to the third and fourth generation because of the repentance there. It's only in unrepentance and a hardening of your own heart that that continues on.

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So it goes back to the effect thing again, once again, that we're not talking about the imputed

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Adamic sin only. We're talking once again about the effects of sin and visiting those effects onto the third and fourth generation.

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We see that today where we have grandchildren who are now addicted to crack because their mothers and grandmothers were addicted to crack or alcoholism that is a trait that runs in the family or whatever.

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It's not a genetic trait. It's a learned behavior. It's that nurture versus nature thing.

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It's that learned behavior that the effects of those sins are being translated. And I mean, we can see this today.

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The family unit has so degenerated and so gone away from God's plan on how we're supposed to be that our society is crumbling because of the loss of the identity of family, whether it be the absentee fathers or whether it be whatever.

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We can see the effects of that generational sin. And people need to hear exactly that.

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People need to hear that though those traits were learned from your parents, you are responsible for your individual choices.

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So just like Pharaoh's, I can't remember the word they used, rebellion or whatever the word was in the question,

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Pharaoh's Rebellion, obviously the people saw Pharaoh's Rebellion and the people of Egypt continued in that sin.

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They are responsible for their individual choices as well, just like our family units are. And so Josiah brought up the conquest of Canaan and the elimination of the

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Canaanites and I'd like to hit that just for a second more. The question asked about the flood and it asked about the children of Egypt, the firstborn.

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I actually think the Canaanites being annihilated is even a more, at first glance at least, a more complicated and difficult one to address.

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Because it says in there, God told Joshua to go and kill everyone, man, woman, child, it doesn't matter, kill everyone.

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But the problem with that is that later on, it's brought up that they didn't all die.

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That they still existed even after that. And so the point is here is that there's still grace even in that.

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That they didn't kill, it was a form of speech where it localized people. Those people were sacrificing their children to a pagan god.

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They were burning them alive. Why we don't do that anymore nowadays, right?

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Right, sacrificing children for, you know, the idea of convenience so that the god would help you, convenience.

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But it's an evil, and as Josiah said, it's an evil and it would not stop.

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Before God gave that order, there were 400 years for them to repent.

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Four hundred years for those people to repent and stop sacrificing their children.

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And they refused and continued in such an evil practice. And so then

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God said, this has come to an end. I will not allow this evil to continue.

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Yeah, you know, that specific example you just referenced with abortion, I won't say a name, but a family member of a prominent politician in our country said recently, and I quote, not only is it unethical to not support abortion, it's un -Christian.

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Oof. Wow. Remember at the end of Timothy when Paul says the people at the end times will have a form of godliness, but they will deny its power, the power thereof?

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There is effects of our sin, and the church needs to wake up and listen to that verse again, but where sin abounds, grace abounds even more.

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So we have one woman repenting, an entire town getting saved in the New Testament, right?

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That's grace. You know, Votie Bachman, probably one of my favorite dudes, awesome guy,

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Votie Bachman says if God does not judge America for abortion, then he owes

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Sodom and Gomorrah an apology. You know, I mean, and there's a reality to that. I'm so glad you just said that, because what did

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Jesus say to, was it Capernaum, right? He said, your, and this is getting to the second question again, your judgment on that day will be worse than that of Gomorrah and Teresa, right?

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It will be worse than that, because if the works that you get to see every day have been done in them, they would have repented.

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So God revealing more and more to them, they are responsible for that which he has revealed to them. How much more in a country where you can't walk half a mile without coming to a church and finding a

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Bible for five bucks, how much free on your phone, how much more? The dispensation of grace calls us to a greater level of responsibility.

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There's no excuse. God will always, Genesis 18, will the judge of all the earth not do that which is right?

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God will always, he will have a very harsh judgment on this country for our abortion and our knowledge and the access we have.

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The Israelites, they were judged more harshly than the

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Canaanites were. Even this harsh judgment that the Lord put on the Canaanites, the

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Israelites by far were judged even harsher. God will always judge his people just like he judges the world.

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I can quote a better philosopher or a better speaker than Bodhi Bachman, with great power comes great responsibility.

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Uncle Ben! Uncle Ben! Just to give two more specific examples for the one the question asked about God's fairness.

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Romans 1 tells us that creation gives credence to the existence of not a

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God, but to God Yahweh. In Genesis 6, just so you understand the fairness, these were not people that God did not give a chance to repent.

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It says they rejected Yahweh. How did they reject someone they didn't know? They did. And they rejected him.

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In Exodus, you read Pharaoh knew Yahweh's power. The people of Egypt were not innocent.

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They knew and they rejected him. So, let's be careful to say that innocent people die.

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There are no innocent people except one about 2 ,000 years ago and then he took on our sins so even he wasn't innocent.

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There's never been an innocent person die. And to the Christians out there, I think this is important for us as believers to understand is that when these questions come up, this isn't so much of answering but just an encouragement to those listening.

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When these questions arise and you're posed to answer them because if you spend any time in the world and you're going to hear this, it is vital, it is so important to start with this premise that Josiah was just talking about that no one is innocent.

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None of us deserve life. None of us deserve existence. We deserve hell and damnation.

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And so, if you don't start with that premise as that is your foundation and starting point, well then you're going to have a difficult time during that conversation.

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I always love it when I talk to people and they talk about innocence, someone usually will bring up, well children are innocent.

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Well, usually right in my mind, I'm like, well you've never had a parent because you've never been a parent before because they're the most self -centered, selfish, stubborn, rebellious.

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You don't have to teach a kid to be bad. You've got to teach them to be good. It takes daily effort time and time again.

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It's because we have that sin nature and that's another thing about repentance in the midst of this.

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People get repentance all confused. They think they need to repent of the individual sinful acts, but what they really need to repent of, that repentance unto salvation is repenting of the sin nature.

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It's that turning away from sin and then by default turning to God. There's a agnostic, borderline atheist named

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David Berlinski, he's a physicist and he was asked about what some of the most absolute truths in the world is and the first thing he said was human nature.

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I owe him a property, he gets it. It was awesome. Even the atheist understands.

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He's a brilliant guy and he actually works for a company that supports intelligent design.

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Even though he's an agnostic, he still works for a company. What's his name? David Berlinski. He's a physicist.

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Brilliant guy. He is not a Christian and he goes back, but even he said, even he said that human nature is the most fundamental, he's the absolute truth we can see.

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It's amazing when I hear everybody talking about diversity of culture today.

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Everything's diversity, but in reality if you strip away certain traditions or whatever, every culture, even cultures that have never met each other, have very similar traits.

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They have a moral compass. They all believe in a higher power. There was no atheistic culture anywhere in recorded history, but there's always been these touchstones in which every culture can be identified and they all share that trait in common.

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It's because we have that common ancestry, but more to the point of this discussion, we all have that indebted and imputed

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Adamic sin that condemns us. Well let me, go ahead. Well, just the last point on this, because the question asks about children.

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First off, the second part of the question, no, it is not our job to judge children for their parents' sin.

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That's not our job, but I did want to point out a mercy thing. One last thing on this, because we just heard, you know, we're all imputed with the

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Adamic sin, that's true, but the question talked about children and I'll leave you to study this on your own, but go read the account of when

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David and Bathsheba sinned against the Lord. And when their child died, their child died, the child obviously was the child that had not repented,

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David said, I will see my child again because the Lord had mercy on the child.

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Even though the child was not old enough to repent, the Lord didn't hold that child accountable for not. That is a good point. That Lord did not hold that child accountable for not repenting.

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That child went to be with the Lord because the Lord is the judge of all the earth and He will do what's right. You know,

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I wrote a paper, a responsive research paper, and if any of you would like a copy, you can simply contact

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Witton Baptist Church, but I wrote a short responsive research paper on where do babies go when they die?

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Because several people, and it's amazing, there are three different instances in Scripture where it's very specific that babies, when they die, are in the presence of the

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Lord. Did you have anything else on this? Well, I was just going to, there was a lot there to kind of make a synopsis if you want to help me with it, but just briefly to make a synopsis, that one, we are all sinful, we are all deserving of death and hell, so to say that God is unfair when a human dies, for really any reason, is not accurate.

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But also that it is important to remember that from God's perspective, we're just changing locations.

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That when God says, hey son, come home, it's not like, oh my gosh, he died, right?

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It's not, oh, my son just died, no, it's a coming home, it's a welcoming party, there's a rejoice and celebration when a child comes into the throne of the king, right?

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And so that's a perspective thing, and I don't think we're at fault for mourning, right?

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That's just natural and it's healthy, but it is good to understand that, that it is not death, we don't actually die, just our bodies die, our bodies cease, and that's important to understand.

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And then lastly, just that God is sovereign overall, He's not caught by surprise, He's not caught by, you know,

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I wonder what's going to happen, that He is sovereign and that nothing is happening outside of His hands. And Matthew talks,

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Jesus talks, and He says, not one sparrow can fall to the ground without my

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Father's allowing. And you talked about this from the pulpit at one point, a sparrow is a worthless bird, it's too small.

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Two sparrows sold for a penny. Yeah, two sparrows sold for a penny, it's not good enough to eat, you can't, you know, it's not a pig, you can't send messages, it's worthless, like, worthless.

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If God knows and cares that much about a sparrow, how much more does

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He care about His children, and not just His children, even the lost, His creation? The image of God, created in the image of God.

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The image of God. God cares that much, it doesn't happen, go by idly, without His knowing, or without His acknowledgement.

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Everything is in His hands, especially, even more so, our lives.

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I appreciate those answers, and before we move on to the second question, let me just have a pastor moment here.

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If any of you have, we used abortion as an example, and it is heinous, to be sure, but I want those of you that maybe have been hurt by abortion, whether directly or indirectly, maybe some of you out there have had to have that first -hand experience with abortion,

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I want to let you know that where sin abounds, grace abounds even more. It's more than just simply a repentance thing, and if I could say this to you, after 27 years of pastoring,

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I have counseled, unfortunately, 70, 80 people, ladies, within the realm of abortion, and there are some things that you're going to need help with.

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You're going to need some great care, and I really would ask you to look in your area, if you're not in the

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Memphis area, find a God -believing church that's going to help you and minister to you, to help you work through the grief and maybe the guilt that you're feeling with this, because I tell you, we have several ladies here that have gone through this, and I tell you, they're some of the strongest witnesses and have come to grips with the love and the grace of Almighty God.

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I promise you this, you can't out -sin the grace of God. You cannot do it. And there remains a hope, and there remains a future for you, not bound by your sin, but bound by the redemptive work of Jesus Christ.

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So, please contact someone and let them help you through this process, alright? Well, let's go to the second question, and basically, the question says this.

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It says, what is the judgment for believers? Now, everyone is familiar.

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I think what they're asking is, if Christians are forgiven, what judgment will they receive from God when they die, or at the end, at the great white throne?

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So, there'll be two judgments, so there's two books, okay? In Revelation 20, it says, and there was another book, the book of life, okay?

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So, there'll be two judgments, so there's two books. There'll be one for the non -believers and one for the believers.

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Those who do not believe, the judgment is condemned. The judgment is of destination.

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The judgment is, you have denied my son, you have denied the grace and the gift that I've given you.

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You have denied me as the holy God. Depart from me, you worker of iniquity, okay?

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But, for the believer, there will still be a judgment. There will still be.

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It says in Matthew that you will be accounted for every idle word that came out of your mouth.

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You'll be judged for what you deal with, what God gave you. Jesus tells the parable, the owner went away, and he gave this man 15 shekels,

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I believe it says. This one, 10 shekels, and this one, 5 shekels. After some years, the owner came back, and the one with 15 shekels, he invested it, made a profit in return, and he said, good done, my faithful servant.

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To the one he gave 10, he invested it, made profit, he said, good job, son. To the one who

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I gave 5, he said, here, I went and buried it, and so that when you return,

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I can give back to you what you gave me. And he punished him. He said, I didn't give you these 5 shekels to do nothing with.

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I gave you these gifts, abilities, skills, and talents so that you can go work with them, help others, and serve the purposes that I have you here for.

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That's how we're going to be judged, is that each of us has been given gifts, has been given abilities, has been given a certain level of grace and knowledge.

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What you do with that is what you're going to be judged with. To the one who has less, okay, well, less will be expected.

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It's not about how much you do, it's about what you did with what God gave you. Do the best you can, keep on going, don't stop, and that's what you'll be judged with.

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Yeah, as far as internal destiny, we were all, we mentioned earlier, since we're all sinners, we were all condemned.

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Right. Every one of us. For the believer, John 5, 24, I assure you, this is

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Jesus talking, Jesus said, I assure you, anyone, anyone who hears my word and believes him who sent me has, right now, eternal life and will not come under judgment, but has passed from death to life.

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Present, future, past. There are differing levels of punishments in hell and different levelings of reward in heaven.

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The Bible isn't super explicit about them. We mentioned one earlier when Jesus told the people of Capernaum that their judgment, their punishment would be worse than those of Sodom and Gomorrah because he's revealed more to them.

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As far as what exactly that entails, we're not sure. I don't think the answer's in Dante's Inferno.

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I think the reason the Bible doesn't say it is because the Bible didn't need us to know it, right? Also, also, oh, we have a question.

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Go ahead. Read the question. It's not a question. Brittany just has a... The rewards in heaven, we're not exactly sure what that is.

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We speak of crowns. The Bible speaks of many crowns. I wouldn't, obviously, do any works for crowns because, apparently, a couple of chapters later, we're going to throw all those crowns at the feet of Jesus anyway.

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Right. So we're not exactly sure what that would look like, but we will be judged for every careless word and with the gifts and talents God's given us for, and the different levels of rewards we'll receive in heaven for that, we're not exactly sure.

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Scripture, as you already said, Scripture's not very explicit on this, but I do think it's important to remember that just in the area where Scripture is quote -unquote silent, that's not an area for us to just go and start trying to fill with what we think is there.

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If Scripture is silent about something, then let it be silent. Say what Scripture does say and leave the rest alone.

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We don't have to start filling that gap, quote -unquote, if you will. We don't have to start filling that gap in.

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Scripture has given us what we need, and we don't need anything else. To be frank, we'll figure out when we get there.

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Well, one of the things to consider, and one of you said it a minute ago, there are different judgments.

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To be real honest, if you're looking, especially you dispensationalists out there, power to the people, you dispensationalists out there,

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God, during that seven years of tribulation, is judging Israel for her unbelief.

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There are many types of judgment, but I think what the person is asking is they're asking specifically at the very end of everything.

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And there are two things you need to see. There's the great white throne of judgment that the

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Word of God talks about, and this is where unbelievers, this is the separation of the wheat and the tares, the goat and the sheep, and so on and so forth.

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And what the people there are being judged for, I think what Jeremiah said right, it's not the individual sins.

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Like, God goes through and sits there and says, what, six -year -old, you stole the Tootsie Roll from Kroger.

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At 22, you murdered a guy. It's because there is no covering for those sins.

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Those sins have not been remitted. They still exist. And so it is that separation, once again, because God is holy, that individual who is inundated with sin is going to be cast in the outer darkness.

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Now, the other judgment, it's talked about in Romans 14 .10, that we all, and remember, we all are talking only of believers because that's who

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Paul's addressing, that's who Scripture's addressed to. We will all appear before the judgment seat of Christ.

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Some of your translations may say the tribunal seat. But the Greek word bima is what's there.

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And you have to understand that Paul uses this word. I think it's in 1 Corinthians 3 as well.

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Paul uses this word specifically, and it had to do with the Olympian games.

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The bima seat was the judgment seat not for, I mean, there was one where if you broke a rule,

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I think especially in wrestling, there was a judge who would actually hit you on the head with a club.

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And, I mean, that was pretty heinous judgment right there. But instead of a flag, you get hit in the head.

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But the bima seat was only for the judge, and that judge's only job who sat in the bima seat, the only job he had was he was the one handing out rewards according to the victory and the event they were in.

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Now, some of those people got larger rewards because it was a greater contest or, you know, greater odds.

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But the bima seat was only judged for what you did as a reward.

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And I think that's something we as Christians need to understand is because the righteous, and it goes back to imputation, that beautiful doctrine where, yes, it's scary that Adam's sin was imputed to all of us.

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But the next two levels of imputation, Romans 5 and elsewhere, where our sin was then imputed.

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You said, you know, Jesus took on the sin. Our sin was imputed to Jesus Christ on the cross.

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But the thing for believers is that third level. His righteousness was imputed on us.

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Christ's righteousness was imputed back on us. He became sin. We could become

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His righteousness. And so when we stand before God, it's not that God can't see it.

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It's that God doesn't just overlook it. It's that it literally has been translated.

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And that's why positional justification and understanding that concept is so important for we are now in Christ.

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To see us, God sees Christ. I think that's just really, really, really important.

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Yeah, that positional sanctification that we were just talking about, when you're placed in Christ, and we've spoken about this here.

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I said justification. I meant sanctification. That positional sanctification we've spoken about, we speak about it here at Witten a lot, when you're placed in Christ, so picture the analogy that Jesus and Paul and John used about the body of Christ.

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When you're placed in Christ, the eye can't say to the ear, I don't need you, and the ear can't say, you know,

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I don't need you. You are now in Christ Jesus. Literally, you are part of His body. When we say the body of Christ, we're literally saying that you have been placed in the body of Christ.

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That's why believers are so united, because we're all part of one body now.

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That's what that means. So on that day, for a believer, God sees

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His son and His righteousness for everyone that is in Christ Jesus. There'll be no weeping.

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There'll be no tears. There'll be no sadness. There'll be no... So whatever, you know, judgment will be of the reward and righteousness, and there'll be no...

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No one is going to be upset. Right. I mean, that Bema Sea, if there's no weeping, there's no crying, there's no sadness, death has been defeated.

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For the Christian, there is nothing to fear. Basically, what the Christian is being judged for is what did you do with the grace that God gave you.

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And some of them... You know, when y 'all were younger, y 'all used to have these drawings that were just ugly.

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I mean, you know, whether your mom had you drawing, you know, a picture of a flower or sunset, and, you know, y 'all would have your little crayons or magic markers.

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It was funny. As ugly as they were, your mother used to hang them on the refrigerator.

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I mean, they were pathetic. They didn't do anything, yet because of whom they belonged to and who you were in relation to her, she still gave them honor.

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And I think the Christian needs to understand it's because who we are in Christ and the honor

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Christ has. I mean, Romans talks that we are joint heirs with Christ. For us, who are in Christ, we are literally going to receive the honor that Christ received.

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We give Christ the honor. God gives His body the honor. And it's just amazing. The female on the cross lived his whole life in rebellion to God.

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In rebellion to God. When he humbled himself and repented in his last 12 hours of life,

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Jesus looked at him and said, Today, you will be with me in paradise. Not because of any righteousness on your own, because he had none.

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Yeah, what works did he do? None. Right? No, because Jesus' righteousness was imputed on him. Where was he baptized? Did he go to the

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First Baptist Church? It rained. It rained, yeah. It rained real hard. That's the power of the saving faith.

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Right. That's the power of the saving faith. Now, to the example you gave about my beautiful pictures. No, I didn't say beautiful.

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I actually really like that example, though, that metaphor, because our works to Christ are as filthy rags.

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Amen. Our good things, our righteous acts, our best days, the best day

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I've ever had is as filthy rags to Christ. And that's an important thing to remember, because God doesn't need us.

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He is not in desperate need of us. My works are not... You're welcome, God.

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Right. You don't tell God you're welcome. Right. He chooses to use us for us.

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Yeah, our best five minutes of Christianity is still a filthy rag before the Lord. He didn't choose to use us because he needed us or because he wanted to.

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For us, it's a blessing for us to be able to do that. Amen. Not a burden.

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Amen. Amen. Well, I know I've enjoyed this, and I hope you all have enjoyed this.

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What I would ask you to do is I would ask you to please write your questions down, and you can either send them...

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And I'm not sure how to do it, but on the Witten Baptist Church public page, you can actually pose a question on the site itself, and we have our music minister and some other folks see those, and we will get to those.

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We've already had a couple of those submitted in that form, and so we will try to answer those questions.

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I know I appreciate you two being here, and do you all have any closing remarks? Yeah, I think you can also send it through Messenger, just on the

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Messenger on Facebook. Send it to Witten Baptist Church, and we can read it that way as well. All right. Jeremiah? Nope.

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Just reminding everyone, YouTube Witten Media Ministries, a lot of these will be posted onto YouTube, and as time goes on, we're going to be continuing doing more of these.

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And a lot of those will be posted on both YouTube and Facebook. So if one or the other, share them.

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Encourage others to go and look those up and watch those. If anyone has any questions or is wondering about anything,

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I really enjoyed this myself. Hope everyone else did. All right. Well, God bless y 'all, and of course tomorrow morning at 10 .30,

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tomorrow morning at 10 .30 Eastern Time, we will be gathering as the people of God here on this public page, and we will be praising

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God at 10 .30 with Brother... Pastor Central Time, yeah? What did I say? Eastern.

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I'm old. Yes, 10 .30, I'm sorry, Central Time. And we will have

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Brother Honey Bunny. He will be leading us in worship and singing.

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He's kind of like the assistant music director here. And then we will hear from the

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Word of God. And then tomorrow night at 6 o 'clock, Brother Josiah will be leading a

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Bible study on Philippians. Are y 'all familiar? Philippians chapter 3. Philippians chapter 3.

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And then Wednesday night as well, Brother Jeremiah will be leading a time and then we will also have a

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Bible study at 7 .30. So you will scroll up. If you actually scroll up on this page or scroll down,

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I don't know which one, you'll actually see what I refer to as the TV guide. My assistant, who is brilliant with this kind of stuff, she put on there kind of a listing of everything that we do throughout the week.

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Guys, it is a great day to be alive in Jesus Christ. I hope you've enjoyed it as much as we have, and we look forward to having this time with you again.