PG-17

There are some things that need to be read without comment. Such is this reference from the Book of Ezekiel. It paints a panorama of God's relationship with Israel, at times with spectacular hues of redemption and mercy and forgiveness and at other times with the dark undertones of distress and agony and sin.

This version is from the New Living Translation, all except for the very ending, which I inserted from The Message. The only other comment I will add is that we in the 21^st Century might change the recipient of this message from Israel to the church.

I warn you – this is God getting as personal as He ever gets in reciting His relationship with His people, thus the title PG-17.

Ezekiel 16

1 Then another message came to me from the LORD: 2 Son of man, confront Jerusalem with her detestable sins. 3 Give her this message from the Sovereign LORD: You are nothing but a Canaanite! Your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite. 4 On the day you were born, no one cared about you. Your umbilical cord was not cut, and you were never washed, rubbed with salt, and wrapped in cloth. 5 No one had the slightest interest in you; no one pitied you or cared for you. On the day you were born, you were unwanted, dumped in a field and left to die.

6 But I came by and saw you there, helplessly kicking about in your own blood. As you lay there, I said, "Live!" 7 And I helped you to thrive like a plant in the field. You grew up and became a beautiful jewel. Your breasts became full, and your body hair grew, but you were still naked.

8 And when I passed by again, I saw that you were old enough for love. So I wrapped my cloak around you to cover your nakedness and declared my marriage vows. I made a covenant with you, says the Sovereign LORD, and you became mine. 9 Then I bathed you and washed off your blood, and I rubbed fragrant oils into your skin. 10 I gave you expensive clothing of fine linen and silk, beautifully embroidered, and sandals made of fine goatskin leather. 11 I gave you lovely jewelry, bracelets, beautiful necklaces, 12 a ring for your nose, earrings for your ears, and a lovely crown for your head.

13 And so you were adorned with gold and silver. Your clothes were made of fine linen and were beautifully embroidered. You ate the finest foods – choice flour, honey, and olive oil – and became more beautiful than ever. You looked like a queen, and so you were! 14 Your fame soon spread throughout the world because of your beauty. I dressed you in my splendor and perfected your beauty, says the Sovereign LORD.

15 But you thought your fame and beauty were your own. So you gave yourself as a prostitute to every man who came along. Your beauty was theirs for the asking. 16 You used the lovely things I gave you to make shrines for idols, where you played the prostitute. Unbelievable! How could such a thing ever happen? 17 You took the very jewels and gold and silver ornaments I had given you and made statues of men and worshiped them. This is adultery against me! 18 You used the beautifully embroidered clothes I gave you to dress your idols. Then you used my special oil and my incense to worship them. 19 Imagine it! You set before them as a sacrifice the choice flour, olive oil, and honey I had given you, says the Sovereign LORD.

20 Then you took your sons and daughters – the children you had borne to me – and sacrificed them to your gods. Was your prostitution not enough? 21 Must you also slaughter my children by sacrificing them to idols? 22 In all your years of adultery and detestable sin, you have not once remembered the days long ago when you lay naked in a field, kicking about in your own blood.

23 What sorrow awaits you, says the Sovereign LORD. In addition to all your other wickedness, 24 you built a pagan shrine and put altars to idols in every town square. 25 On every street corner you defiled your beauty, offering your body to every passerby in an endless stream of prostitution. 26 Then you added lustful Egypt to your lovers, provoking my anger with your increasing promiscuity.

27 That is why I struck you with my fist and reduced your boundaries. I handed you over to your enemies, the Philistines, and even they were shocked by your lewd conduct. 28 You have prostituted yourself with the Assyrians, too. It seems you can never find enough new lovers! And after your prostitution there, you still were not satisfied. 29 You added to your lovers by embracing Babylonia, the land of merchants, but you still weren't satisfied.

30 What a sick heart you have, says the Sovereign LORD, to do such things as these, acting like a shameless prostitute. 31 You build your pagan shrines on every street corner and your altars to idols in every square. In fact, you have been worse than a prostitute, so eager for sin that you have not even demanded payment. 32 Yes, you are an adulterous wife who takes in strangers instead of her own husband. 33 Prostitutes charge for their services – but not you! You give gifts to your lovers, bribing them to come and have sex with you. 34 So you are the opposite of other prostitutes. You pay your lovers instead of their paying you!"

35 Therefore, you prostitute, listen to this message from the LORD! 36 This is what the Sovereign LORD says: Because you have poured out your lust and exposed yourself in prostitution to all your lovers, and because you have worshiped detestable idols, and because you have slaughtered your children as sacrifices to your gods, 37 this is what I am going to do. I will gather together all your allies – the lovers with whom you have sinned, both those you loved and those you hated – and I will strip you naked in front of them so they can stare at you. 38 I will punish you for your murder and adultery. I will cover you with blood in my jealous fury.

39 Then I will give you to these many nations who are your lovers, and they will destroy you. They will knock down your pagan shrines and the altars to your idols. They will strip you and take your beautiful jewels, leaving you stark naked. 40 They will band together in a mob to stone you and cut you up with swords. 41 They will burn your homes and punish you in front of many women. I will stop your prostitution and end your payments to your many lovers.

42 Then at last my fury against you will be spent, and my jealous anger will subside. I will be calm and will not be angry with you anymore. 43 But first, because you have not remembered your youth but have angered me by doing all these evil things, I will fully repay you for all of your sins, says the Sovereign LORD. For you have added lewd acts to all your detestable sins.

44 Everyone who makes up proverbs will say of you, "Like mother, like daughter." 45 For your mother loathed her husband and her children, and so do you. And you are exactly like your sisters, for they despised their husbands and their children. Truly your mother was a Hittite and your father an Amorite.

46 Your older sister was Samaria, who lived with her daughters in the north. Your younger sister was Sodom, who lived with her daughters in the south. 47 But you have not merely sinned as they did. You quickly surpassed them in corruption. 48 As surely as I live, says the Sovereign LORD, Sodom and her daughters were never as wicked as you and your daughters. 49 Sodom's sins were pride, gluttony, and laziness, while the poor and needy suffered outside her door. 50 She was proud and committed detestable sins, so I wiped her out, as you have seen.

51 Even Samaria did not commit half your sins. You have done far more detestable things than your sisters ever did. They seem righteous compared to you. 52 Shame on you! Your sins are so terrible that you make your sisters seem righteous, even virtuous.

53 But someday I will restore the fortunes of Sodom and Samaria, and I will restore you, too. 54 Then you will be truly ashamed of everything you have done, for your sins make them feel good in comparison. 55 Yes, your sisters, Sodom and Samaria, and all their people will be restored, and at that time you also will be restored. 56 In your proud days you held Sodom in contempt. 57 But now your greater wickedness has been exposed to all the world, and you are the one who is scorned--by Edom and all her neighbors and by Philistia. 58 This is your punishment for all your lewdness and detestable sins, says the LORD.

59 Now this is what the Sovereign LORD says: I will give you what you deserve, for you have taken your solemn vows lightly by breaking your covenant.

60 Yet I will remember the covenant I made with you when you were young, and I will establish an everlasting covenant with you. 61 Then you will remember with shame all the evil you have done. I will make your sisters, Samaria and Sodom, to be your daughters, even though they are not part of our covenant. 62 And I will reaffirm my covenant with you, and you will know that I am the LORD. 63 You will remember your sins and cover your mouth in silent shame when I forgive you of all that you have done. It will leave you speechless. I, the Sovereign LORD, have spoken!

Gleanings from Experiencing God

We are now in the sixth week of our study of Experiencing God, which means we are nearing the half-way point of our study! One of the activities in Unit 5 is to go back over the previous four units and review the most significant verses or statements recorded at the end of each day's study.

I think it would be great for us to hear what you have gleaned from the study so far. If you will, please send me an email with a summary statement (two or three statements will be ok) and let me know what you are learning. Unless you object, I would like to post your responses on the blog. I look forward to hearing from you.

Below are the things I recorded at the end of each day. These twenty statements are not all that I have gained from the study. They are only a sampling of the content of each lesson. For each Scripture reference, hold your mouse over the reference to read the Scripture.

If you prefer, you can click here to download or print a copy.

Unit 1

• Philippians 2:13; John 7:17
  
• The question is not "What is God's will for me" but "What is God's will?"
  
• What are we doing in our church that we could do without God?
  
• God does not tell us what to do, then send us off to do it. He works and invites (calls) us to join Him where He is already working.
  
• 1 Cor. 1:26-31. God uses ordinary people to accomplish extraordinary things.
  

Unit 2

• The Bible is not about man's walk with God, but a record of God accomplishing His purpose. The Bible is not man-centered but God-centered.
  
• Moses required forty years of exile in a wilderness to get him back on track with God.
  
• The key to knowing God's will is not a method, but a relationship. It is listening to the Spirit speak through the word of God and confirming it through peace in our hearts.
  
• John 8:47
  
• Nothing is more pathetic than having a small character and a big assignment.
  

Unit 3

• Everything about our lives, our understanding of God, and our relationship with Him depends on our understanding that our purpose for existing is to give God glory.
  
• God did not create us for time, but for eternity. Our focus should not be on our past but on our future – on becoming like Christ. Romans 8:29
  
• Every scripture speaks the same message – salvation is God's prerogative. We are saved because He chose us, not because we invited Him into our hearts. (John 6:44; John 6:65; Luke 10:22; John 15:16)
  
• God is working in our world. We do not work and ask God to bless our work. He calls us to join Him in the word He is already doing. We are blessed as a result.
  

Unit 4

• The Scriptures are a record of God's revelation of Himself to people.
  
• Obedience is an outward expression of your love for God. If you have an obedience problem, you have a love problem.
  
• Deut. 6:24-25. When God gives a command, He is not restricting you. He is freeing you. God's commands are designed to lead you to life's best.
  
• God works through people whom He chooses when He chooses to call them, regardless of their relationship to Him. (This is not exactly what Henry Blackaby taught, but it is closer to the truth of the matter than what the workbook says.)
  
• People do not seek God unless He is at work in their lives. As Jesus passed through a crowd, He always looked for where the Father was at work. The crowd is not the harvest field. The harvest field is within the crowd. (I would have said this differently: The crowd is the harvest field, but the crowd is not the harvest. The harvest is found within the crowd.)
  
  • Isaiah 46:11. What God initiates He always completes.
    

Thanks, PD.

Sermon 11Jul2010: Extension, Acts 8.5-25

Click on one of these links to download or on the player below to listen.
Sermon 11Jul2010 mp3
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Walking by Faith

One of the more memorable verses in the Bible is Hebrews 11:1 which says, "Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen."

Sometimes, though, familiarity causes us to overlook some very important concepts. There is something very significant in this verse that is easy to overlook, which in turn leads to a misunderstanding of related verses.

Notice that faith is not the "things hoped for," and it is not the things "not seen."

Faith is not hoping for something. Faith is the substance of what we hope for. In other words, faith is that which brings our hopes into living color and reveals them to our senses.

Faith is not composed of what we cannot see. Faith is the evidence that what we cannot see is real – that even the things that we cannot see are truth. Faith is substance – solid matter and observable phenomena that make visible those things that are for the moment invisible.

Faith is our observation of what has been and what is, which leads us to act on the belief that what will be or what cannot yet be seen is truth.

Faith is not based on what we cannot see but on what we can see.

Faith in Christ means that we take the full measure of Christ – who He is, what He has done, of his ministry, his passion, his death and resurrection – all things that are either evidential (his deity) or observable (his ministry), and on that basis we trust in what is coming.

With this understanding, read again Ephesians 2:8, "For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God." It should now be more apparent than ever why the faith that leads to salvation does not find its source within us, but in Christ. He is the substance and the evidence – the solid ground upon which our salvation and our future are founded and secured.

Thus a walk of faith is not a leap in the dark, but a walk in the light which reveals the future to us with the same assurance as if it were a current event.

Walking by faith means resting in the knowledge of Christ gleaned from the word of God as well as our personal experience of knowing Him as Lord and Savior.

Here is the concrete and substantive foundation for previewing the future, which should reduce or remove our fear of coming days.

Accusations - The Trial & Stoning of Stephen

Sermon 27Jun2010 mp3
Sermon 27Jun2010 Word
Sermon 27Jun2010 pdf

Bailed out!

OK. I did my time and served my sentence for MDA. I know that many of you are regretful that they did not keep me longer, but I was able to bail out. Thanks to all who contributed. We were able to raise $715.00 for the cause. I had to eat jail house food, but life is tough. (Actually, it was roast beef, mashed potatoes & gravy, corn, bread, and sweet tea!). Thanks again for your support. PD

To Die is Gain

One of the more intriguing questions of life to me is why the church seems to have so little apparent impact on our community and our nation. I know that some churches are booming, but it seems that, even in light of church growth, there is little change in the moral fabric of our society except in a downward direction.

Maybe it's just my perspective and things are much more positive than they appear on the surface. Yet I do not see much evidence of an improvement in morality – especially in our political leadership. I certainly do not see a love of Christ or a desire for knowing and worshiping God.

I think that here is one reason this may be true.

Hebrews 9.22 says, "Without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sins."

I have always interpreted that verse on a limited basis – that "shedding of blood" refers to the shedding of the blood of Christ, and "remission of sins" refers to the sins remitted by the blood of Christ. The verse should certainly be interpreted this way.

Yet what if there is more to its meaning? Could this verse also mean that persecution – or more appropriately, martyrdom – is that which makes the Gospel message effective?

In America, we are shielded from persecution by the First Amendment. Could the reason that the church seems to be so impotent in impacting our culture is that there is no persecution? (I mean persecution in the New Testament sense of Hebrews 11, not that your friends won't speak to you because you went to church and not to the beach.)

How many of us are willing to die for what we believe concerning Christ? Could it be that, for the church to grow, we must go and die as necessary?

Tertullian said, "The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church."

An article I read recently said it this way: "The blood of the martyrs is a necessary means for the worldwide application of Christ's great redemptive accomplishment."

The church is the body of Christ; thus, our blood is His blood. This brings a new significance to Paul's testimony in Phil. 1.21: "For me, to live is Christ, to die is gain."

Earlier in the year, I preached on this verse and made the point that Paul was in a quandary. His desire was to go to be in the presence of Christ, but he also knew that he had a mission to accomplish in establishing and strengthening the church. Paul clearly expresses that conflict of heart.

But in light of the thoughts of this blog – that "the blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church" – the concept of "to die is gain" also takes on new meaning.

Historically, the church blossoms in times of persecution. It languishes in times of peace.

The Apostle Peter wrote, "For to this (persecution) you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example, so that you might follow in his steps." (1 Peter 2:19-21)

We pray for our churches to grow, but would we be so strong to desire growth if we knew that the price for growth involves losing our freedom or possibly our lives for the cause of Christ?

Just thinking.

Experiencing God

Reports from each of the small groups studying Experiencing God this summer have all been great. Each team has either six or seven members and, from what I have gathered, the members of each team are not only gaining a greater understanding of God, but are growing closer to one another at the same time.

That's the way it is supposed to work. When God's people get closer to Him, they naturally grow closer to one another. When we seem to be drawing farther from each other, that is evidence that we are not growing in Christ and have drifted farther from the Father.

Holiness in individuals brings wholesomeness in the church.

In a sermon that I recently listened to, David Platt, Pastor of Brook Hills Church in Birmingham, AL, said, "God is more interested in the sanctity of His people than He is in the success of His church."

In 1 Cor. 2.9, Paul quotes from Isaiah 64.4, "Since the beginning of the world men have not heard nor perceived by the ear, nor has the eye seen any God besides You, Who acts for the one who waits for Him."

Many people have applied this verse to the future when all of the people of God are gathered together in His presence in Eternity. But I believe the verse speaks of a more contemporary time, because Paul goes on to say in 1 Cor. 2.10, "But God has revealed these things to us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searches all things, even the deep things of God."

The Spirit knows the deepest thoughts of God, and we are the recipients of those thoughts. By the Holy Spirit, we have been given a look into the mind of God concerning salvation and the grace of God that no other people have ever had before the time of Christ – including the prophets who wrote foretelling the coming of Christ.

The world cannot conceive of such knowledge because it can only come from knowing Christ and being filled with the Holy Spirit. (1 Cor. 2:14) Earlier in the New Testament, the Apostle John wrote, "Whoever is of God hears the words of God. The reason why you do not hear them is that you are not of God." (John 8:47)

However, things are very different for those who know Christ as Savior. In a later verse in 1 Cor. 1, Paul wrote, "We have the mind of Christ." (1 Cor. 10:16)

There is a joy that accompanies such knowledge, but these verses are about more than just joy and happiness. There is a certainty that God does talk to His people and that He is constantly teaching us more and more about who He is through His word and through our walk with Him – through our daily experiences of seeing Him at work in our lives as well as in the affairs of the world.

This is the theme of Experiencing God. We are called to know Him and to experience Him and to glory in HIm as our Lord. Henry Blackaby has pointed out that the Bible is a God-centered book and the message is a God-centered message.

The Bible is not the story of the progress of man from his deadly state of sin to eternal life, but it is the story of God working out His purposes among men and through men. Throughout Scripture, it is God who takes the initiative in all of the affairs of men.

There is so much to be learned in this study that I pray you are taking it seriously and spending the time required to comprehend what is meant by experiencing God.

Father's Day Sermon - Leaving a Legacy, John 5.17-21

Sermon 20Jun2010 mp3
Sermon 20Jun2010 Word
Sermon 20Jun2010 PDF