Amen. Okay, we're in 1 Samuel chapter 5 and this is actually one of my favorite stories in the Bible.
The title of my sermon tonight is,
Holy Things in Unholy Hands.
Let me give you a little bit of a background on what's taking place here in this particular story.
We're going to go through 1 Samuel chapter 5 and 6.
Prior to this, of course, we have what's called the Ark of the Covenant.
The Ark of the Covenant was essentially a gold-plated structure that God commanded from Moses to make
where you had the Ten Commandments, you had Aaron's Raw that butted, and you had the manna as well.
And this essentially signified where the presence of God would dwell.
And essentially, as long as the children of Israel obeyed the Lord, they kept His commandments,
they did what they were supposed to do, adhere to the Covenant,
then when they had that Ark, they would essentially prosper in everything that they did,
specifically when they would go out to war, right?
So anytime they would go out to battle, as long as they had the presence of God
as signified by the Ark of the Covenant, they would be blessed, they would be victorious,
God would be with them, and so forth.
And so, obviously, this is a physical thing that God commanded to be within the nation of Israel
in order to signify that God was with that nation.
Now, by the time we get to 1 Samuel chapter 4, a lot has happened.
You know, you have a lot of corrupt leaders.
You have Eli and his sons, Hofney and Phineas, who according to the Bible were sons of Belial.
They were reprobates.
They were evil and wicked people.
And for the sake of time, we're not going to necessarily cover that entire story.
But, you know, they go to war with the Philistines, and they think to themselves,
well, you know, let's just bring the Ark of the Covenant with us,
and we will obviously be victorious against the Philistines.
So, they're essentially treating the Ark of the Covenant somewhat like a lucky charm.
They're being superstitious about the Ark of the Covenant,
thinking, well, we could just be wicked and be reprobates and disobey the Lord
and not obey the Lord in these areas.
But as long as we have the Ark of the Covenant, everything should be hunky-dory.
We should be able to defeat the Philistines.
Now, obviously, that didn't happen.
And in fact, the Bible specifically said that God wanted to kill Hofney and Phineas
because there were sons of Belial, there were godless people,
there were reprobates, children of the devil,
and the Bible says that he would destroy them.
He wanted to kill them.
And so, when this war took place, they ended up dying in battle,
and the Philistines, who are a heathen nation,
their heathen people,
ended up stealing the Ark of the Covenant and bringing it into their lands.
So, you have the children of Israel suffering a great defeat,
and this is where you have the term Ichabod,
which means the glory of God has departed
as noted by the fact that the physical Ark of the Covenant is taken.
It's essentially symbolizing that God's presence, God's glory, is not there.
Now, obviously, folks, you know, when you read these chapters,
we can see that the glory of God departed long ago, right?
As noted by the fact that Eli, his eyes were dim,
he wasn't a great leader, his sons are super wicked,
but the nail in the coffin, the straw that broke the camel's back,
that indicator that he was no longer there
was the fact that they took the Ark of the Covenant.
So, now we're in chapter 5, and in chapter 5,
we see what happens when you put something so sacred
and holy as the Ark of the Covenant
in the hands of Godless people, okay?
And that's what I'm going to preach on this evening.
Now, how do we apply this?
Well, you know, sometimes people think,
well, as long as we put someone in the right environment,
as long as we put someone around the right type of people,
they're just going to turn out, right?
They're going to be good people, great Christians,
but it doesn't necessarily work that way, okay?
You know, if you put an unsafe person in our church,
it doesn't mean that they're going to be a great person.
You know, they have to get saved.
They have to be regenerated.
They have to have their sins forgiven.
They have to have that new man,
the Holy Spirit of God in them,
and that's all based upon whether they believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ or not.
So you can have the greatest church
with the greatest of preaching.
You can have great sermons.
You can have great hymns.
You can have an environment
that is conducive to spiritual growth,
but it means nothing to the unsafe person
if they don't actually get saved, right?
You can place an unholy person
within a holy environment.
It does nothing to them
if they don't actually choose to believe
on the Lord Jesus Christ.
You know, you can place a King James Bible
on the coffee table of an unsafe house
and it does nothing for them.
They can operate, they can use it like a lucky charm
and to ward off the spirits and the vampires
and you know, so that no, it does nothing.
You know, and by the way, the King James Bible
is the inspired, preserved word of God
for the English-speaking people.
It's the only Bible that Christians should be using.
You know, all other modern versions are fraudulent.
They're fake.
They're trashy.
They're not God's word, okay?
They're a corruption of God's word is what it is.
And so, but here's the thing.
If you give someone the King James Bible
which is the accurate and Aaron-inspired word of God,
you know, it does nothing to them
if they don't believe the words
that are written in that book.
Keeping it on the coffee table does nothing.
You know, you're not blessed by osmosis
by having the Bible in your presence, right?
You're like, well, you know, I have a King,
I have five King James Bible on my bookshelf.
It does nothing for your bookshelf.
It does nothing for your spiritual life.
It does nothing for you, okay?
And so, it's important for us to realize
that just because you put a holy thing
in the hands of an unholy person,
it actually does nothing for them.
We're not the superstitious type to think that,
well, you know, as long as we put this person
alongside a righteous individual,
that somehow they're gonna influence that person,
that righteous individual is gonna make them
better spiritually, doesn't work that way
because everyone has a choice.
And they have to choose to be renewed.
You know, reformation is great,
but reformation has an end.
You need transformation, right?
You can have someone come into our church
and be reformed.
What does that mean?
You know, they come in here
and maybe they're a drug addict or whatever
and they're trying to get cleaned up.
And they come here,
they hear preaching about alcohol and drugs and whatnot
and they can even clean up their lines in that regard.
They can buy a suit.
They can part their hair.
They can sing the hymns.
They can buy the Bible.
But folks, that's all reformation
and if there's no transformation
that comes about because you believe on Christ,
it means nothing.
Now, what are we talking about with transformation?
We're talking about salvation, being born again, okay?
You know, if any man be in Christ,
he is a new creature.
Old things have passed away.
Behold, all things have become new.
It's referring to salvation.
And so, you know, we're not necessarily
looking to reform people.
We're looking to reform Christians
after they've already gotten saved
but not to reform unbelievers
because that does nothing for them.
It's essentially putting holy things in unholy hands.
And as we're gonna see tonight,
that is often detrimental to the individual
and it does nothing for them.
So let's read here.
Look at verse number one.
The first thing we're gonna look at here
is that when you place a holy thing
in an unholy hand,
it actually desecrates holy things, okay?
Look at verse one.
And the Philistines took the Ark of God
and brought it for Ebenezer unto Ashton.
And when the Philistines took the Ark of God,
they brought it into the house of Dagon
and set it by Dagon.
So when they're bringing this Ark of the Covenant,
they're just not like, they're not like,
hey, you know what?
We probably shouldn't be worshiping false gods.
This is the real deal here.
Let's, you know, repent of our ways.
Let's get rid of our false gods.
Let's get rid of Dagon.
Let's get rid of these devils
and start worshiping the God of the Bible.
What do they do?
What happens when you place a holy thing
into the hands of unholy men?
They just basically add God
to their plethora of false gods.
When you add Jesus Christ to your religion
and you're just like, well, you know,
I believe in Jesus Christ.
I think he is the Christ.
I believe he is the Messiah.
But you don't believe that he's God.
You don't believe that he's forgiven you
of all your sins
and that he died on the cross to pay for your sins.
Guess what?
It does nothing for you.
It changes nothing for you.
In fact, it desecrates you.
Okay?
It actually makes you worse
and it desecrates Christ.
Why?
Because Christ is not interested
in being added to
your shelf of false gods.
Okay?
You know, you ask a Hindu, a Buddhist.
If you were to give a Hindu or a Buddhist,
some idol of Jesus Christ
and we're not four idols of Jesus Christ.
But let's say you just give them
an idol of Jesus Christ.
You know, they're not,
they're not going to be against it.
They're like, oh, thank you.
You know, they view it as like a lucky charm.
Oh, this will ward off
the so-called spirits of whatever
and they'll just put it on their shelf
along with all the other false gods
that they have,
thinking that that's how
somehow going to improve their life.
But what is that?
That is a desecration of the name of God.
Thinking that you could just add Jesus Christ
to your plethora of false gods.
There should be no God before him,
the Bible says.
That's literally like the first commandment
in the Ten Commandments.
Thou shalt have no other gods before me.
I am the Lord
and there's no savior.
Listen to this.
Beside me.
What are they doing?
They're placing Jesus
or they're placing the God of the Bible
at this time
right next to Dagon.
Now, who's Dagon?
Exactly.
Who's Dagon?
Dagon is basically historically
referred to as the Fish God.
You know,
so it was like,
you know,
some say it was just like this anthropomorphic image
of like a half man,
half,
it's like Aquaman or something like that.
You know,
where it looked like a fish,
but it was a man
and they had this image of him.
This is who the gods,
this is who the people of the Philistines
would worship is Dagon.
Okay.
And some say he was the God of fertility,
blah, blah, blah.
It is a devil is what it is.
Okay.
There is no other gods.
There's lowercase G gods,
but these aren't gods.
These are devils,
according to the Bible.
So what are they doing?
Does bringing the Ark of the Covenant
into Philistine territory
improve the Philistines?
No,
because they just add him
to their false gods.
They're like,
well,
now we got two gods.
We have the Ark of the Covenant
and we have Dagon.
But of course,
we know that the Bible
is completely against.
Go to 1 Corinthians,
chapter eight,
if you would.
1 Corinthians,
chapter eight.
1 Corinthians,
chapter eight.
Now,
let me just remind you
that as Christians,
we should flee idolatry,
meaning that
Christians should have nothing
to do with idols.
And I'm not just referring
to idols of false gods
like Dagon.
I'm talking about idols
of images
that are made of things
of heaven above,
such as the Godhead,
images of Jesus Christ,
images of Mary,
images of the saints,
Catholics,
icons and so forth.
These are things
that the Bible renders
and classifies as being an idol.
And the Bible tells us
keep yourselves from idols.
And look folks,
idolatry is a major sin
in the Bible.
Okay.
It should not be taken lightly.
And in fact,
it's such a grievous sin
in the eyes of God
that if someone commits idolatry
in the local New Testament church,
they are excommunicated
if they're unwilling
to repent of that.
Now, what do we mean by that?
Meaning that if you're carrying
some Virgin Mary
in your vehicle
because your grandma
gave it to you,
according to the Bible,
you're an idolater.
You're like,
why don't we really worship it?
God doesn't care
what you think worship is
or not.
The mere fact
that you possess the idol
classifies you being an idolater.
And he doesn't care
if you have it
for sentimental reasons.
Oh, it's a good luck charm.
Oh, my grandma gave it to me.
Oh, I'm Mexican.
You know, oh, you know,
you don't understand.
It's made out of gold
or whatever.
He doesn't care.
Get rid of it.
And here's the thing.
He's like,
why don't I pray to it
but you have it.
And the Bible not only condemns
venerating, praying towards,
worshiping these idols.
It just condemns
having them, period.
Okay.
Especially if you think,
you know,
if you ascribe
some sort of power
to that idol.
And look,
that also includes crosses.
If you have a cross
with the dead Jesus on there,
first and foremost,
that's not Jesus.
You say,
well, how do you know?
Well, because he didn't stay
on the cross.
So why have this morbid Jesus
on a cross?
You're just carrying around.
You just have it in your church.
That's called an idol.
And look, a lot of people think,
you know,
and I used to think this
because I was a Catholic
at one point,
you know,
that if you had some sort
of Jesus cross crucifix
where he's on there
in your home,
that somehow
that would protect you
or something like that.
Right.
You know,
Catholics will often think,
well,
if I carry this with me,
this is going to kind of protect
me from the evil spirits.
It's called superstition.
That's exactly what Catholics do.
They're just superstitious people
thinking that that's going to ward
off the vampires
and the werewolves
and the zombies or whatever.
But it does nothing.
This is what is referred
to as idolatry.
It's when you ascribe
some sort of supernatural power
to that physical cross.
And look,
I'm not against people
having crosses,
you know,
as a necklace.
You know,
obviously I am against having
Jesus on that cross.
But let me say this.
If you like require,
if you need to have a cross
around your neck
because you're afraid something
might happen to you,
okay.
Now you're a superstitious person.
You're ascribing power
to a physical thing
that's wrapped around your neck
that does nothing for you.
Let me tell you
who protects you
is the Lord.
Ten thousand shall fall
on my right side.
Ten thousand on my left
shall not come nying to me.
Okay.
And we need to understand
that idolatry is a major thing.
And you know,
you may not think too much
of idolatry because we live
in the United States of America
where, you know,
in general,
people would consider it to be
somewhat of a Christian nation
as a lot of churches.
But around the world,
idolatry is extremely rampant.
Southeast Asia,
they have altars and idols
literally on every corner.
Okay.
And so,
and here's the thing.
This is what happens
when you bring people
of other cultures
into the United States
of America.
What does it do?
It actually normalizes idolatry.
Oh, that's just who they are.
They're just, you know,
that's what they believe.
That, you know,
they're Catholics,
you know,
they're Buddhists,
that they're Hindus,
they're Muslims or whatever.
This is just what they believe.
That's what they do.
Yeah.
But they're bringing in
Godless customs
that's contrary to the word
of God.
And before you know,
we're going to be like
Southeast Asia.
Whereas just you have
all these idols in the land
displeasing God
because of that.
And so,
it's important to know,
look at 1 Corinthians
chapter 8
and look down to your
Bibles at verse number 4.
It says,
as concerning, therefore,
the eating of those things
that are offered
in sacrifice into idols,
we know that an idol
is nothing in the world
and that there is none other
God but one.
So in other words,
you know,
don't fear the idol.
Oh, Annabelle.
There's this doll.
It's Annabelle.
She might kill me.
It's a doll.
I'll whoop that doll.
Just burn it.
It's a doll.
But this is how superstitious people are.
And look, again,
Roman Catholicism is notorious for this
where they literally have
fragments of human remains
and they idolize it.
Now, a couple years ago,
they had supposedly
the hand of Jude or something.
You know,
and they brought it to Orange County
or whatever.
That's someone else's dude's hand,
but that's not Jude's hand.
They dug some random
dude out of the grave
and just say that's Jude.
They're going to believe it.
They believe everything else.
And they just got someone's corpse.
It might not even be that.
It might just be like paper mache.
We don't know.
But it's just like, oh, it has so much power.
It's just able to do so many things.
It's just, you know,
this idol, we got to be careful.
You know, I'm scared of that thing.
You're superstitious.
The idol is nothing the Bible says.
You know, years ago,
what we did in order to prevent idolatry
from, you know,
unforeseen idolatry
from getting a foothold in our church,
we had idol burning Sunday.
Because you know,
we had a lot of former Catholics
and former Orthodox.
And so we encourage everyone
to bring their idols to church
and we're going to have
a bonfire of idols.
We're just throwing them into the fire.
People just repenting of their idolatry.
And you know, we have some Orthodox guys.
So one of them in particular
just rose an idolatry.
You know, you're just bringing all kinds of images
and wood and whatnot.
And then we just had people
who were just pyromaniacs
and they just wanted to burn stuff.
Glenn was bringing like Mickey Mouse.
This is kind of like an idol, right?
Some people idol,
I was like,
I just want to burn stuff at this point.
You know, just random.
You know, covetousness is idolatry.
So you don't just throw money
in the flames or whatever.
But you know, it was good
because you know, we had,
I think we had it twice back to back.
And you know,
we would burn these idols
and the bigger idols
we gave bats to the kids.
Give them goggles, okay?
And they're just smashing the idols.
We're just teaching them
to hate idolatry, okay?
But we obviously know
that the idol is nothing.
It's not going to do anything to you.
It's not going to fly at you.
It's not going to talk to you.
It's not going to harm you or anything.
It's nothing.
The Buddha goes on to say in verse 5,
for though there be
that are called God,
whether in heaven or in earth,
as there be God's many
and Lord's many,
but to us there is
but one God,
the Father,
of whom are all things
and we in him
and one Lord Jesus Christ
by whom are all things
and we by him.
Go to chapter 10,
if you would,
chapter 10.
Look at verse 19 here.
Like, well, the idol is nothing.
Then what's the problem?
You know,
if it's not going to do anything to me,
what's the harm
of keeping my little St. Joseph
in my drawer?
You know,
what harm is it?
You know,
well,
here's the harm
is that God's going to destroy you
because you ain't listening.
And he's offended
at that idol, okay?
Because you're basically taking Jesus
and you're putting him
next to this idol.
Look what it says in verse 19.
It says,
What say I then
that the idol is anything
or that which is offered
in sacrifice to idols
is anything?
But I say
that the things
which the Gentiles sacrifice,
they sacrifice to devils
and not to God
and I would not
that ye should have fellowship
with devils.
Ye cannot drink
the cup of the Lord
and the cup of devils.
Ye cannot be partakers
of the Lord's table
and of the table of devils.
In other words,
you can't say that you're worshiping God
and you're keeping these idols
with you in your house.
You know,
it is an oxymoron is what it is.
You're contradicting yourself
by saying,
well,
you know,
I worship God
but then you have these
images,
you have these idols
in your house.
And in fact,
look what it goes on to say
in verse 22.
Do we provoke the Lord
to jealousy?
Are we stronger than he?
So what are you doing actually
when you possess these
images,
these idols?
And yeah,
you don't worship them.
You're just carrying them
for sentiment of value.
You're provoking the Lord
to jealousy.
You're making them mad.
You're basically taking
the Ark of the Covenant
and putting it
right beside
Dagon.
That's how God views it.
Okay.
So what should I do?
Burn it!
Throw it in the trash.
Stomp on it.
Have an idol burning
Sunday at your house.
Take all your idols,
throw them in the trash
and look, you know,
I feel very strongly about this
because I came from Catholicism
and I think it's very important.
And in fact, you know,
and I just don't think
Christians really think
it's that important.
They're not as zealous
about it
as they should be.
You know,
I'll give you an example.
You know,
a couple of weeks ago,
you know,
sometimes people
just give you stuff, right?
And they don't really
think about
what they're giving you
or whatever.
And you know,
people give my mom
things a lot.
Okay.
And you know,
one time I went over
to her house
and you know,
I'm just kind of talking
to my mom.
I was with my wife
and then,
you know,
my wife was like,
you know,
there's like idols in here.
I was like,
where?
I'm like,
Oh dang.
Like,
how did I not see this?
But there was like
three fat Buddhas.
And look,
here's the thing folks
is that Buddha,
he's not a God,
but it's still an idol though.
It's classified
as an idol
according to the Bible
because I don't get
my classification
or definitions
of ungodly people,
unholy people.
Well,
it's not really worship.
It's veneration.
It's worship.
I'm not asking you.
No one asked you,
bro.
Okay.
According to the Bible,
it's classified as an idol.
So my wife is like,
there's like,
Buddha's here.
And I was like,
I was horrified.
And I'm like,
mom,
do you know that there's
you have Buddhas in the house?
It's like,
oh yes.
You know,
someone sent this to me
or whatever.
I'm like,
you can't have these.
This is idolatry.
She's like,
really?
I'm like,
yeah.
I'm like,
this is,
uh,
you're provoking the Lord to
Chelsea here
because you're a saved woman.
You're having these
and she didn't really realize
how bad it was.
You know,
and I'm like,
I was explaining to her
the concept of idolatry
and the fact that
these should not be in the home.
And I said,
but don't worry.
I'm a good son.
I'll take care of them for you.
And she's like,
oh no,
don't do that.
I could just sell them.
We're not selling them
because my mom,
my mom likes to sell things.
You know,
and,
and I was just like,
no,
we're not selling them.
I'm going to give her
a room for you.
Okay.
And she's like,
oh,
do you really have?
I'm like,
yes.
And it's not because
her heart was endeared
to these idols
because she just
want to make money off of them.
You know,
she's just like,
I could,
you know,
I could sell this
to some Buddhist
or whatever
and they'll pay
a pretty penny for this.
you know,
and you know,
I said,
no,
I'm just going to
take care of them.
You know,
and so like,
when,
when she wasn't looking
and look,
I'm not saying
you should do this.
I'm just saying
what I do.
As she's distracted,
my mom just grabbed
the paper bag
just throw all the idols
in there.
I'm like,
okay,
mom got to go.
I'll see you later.
You know,
and took them
and went trash to them.
She probably looking for them.
She can't fight them.
You know,
I don't want my mom
provoking the Lord to jealousy.
Call me Jeri Bale.
You know,
and so it's important
for us to be zealous
about these things
and recognize
it's not just a matter of,
oh,
well,
I'm not praying
to this idol.
Well,
don't even have it.
Right.
Don't even have it.
Trash it.
Just destroy it.
Burn it in the fire
and teach your kids
and your family
what it is,
what the Bible
talks about idolatry
and how
we should not be idolaters.
Go back to 1st Samuel.
If you would.
1st Samuel
Chapter 5.
And so,
you know,
when you put
holy things
in unholy hands,
you actually end up
desecrating
the holy things.
Okay,
you're
provoking the Lord
to jealousy.
It's not like
God doesn't view it
as you just being
tolerant of other people
or you're just so loving.
No,
he's a jealous God
and he's not going to
share his glory
with anybody,
especially some fat little
idol
of Buddha
of someone
who's literally
burning in hell today.
Okay.
And you can insert
anybody else
into that.
And here's the thing.
You know these
you say,
what about saints?
You know,
saints are saved.
Yeah.
And you know what?
They're probably horrified
of what people
have been doing
to their names
over the last couple
thousand years.
Right.
You know,
just like I'm sure
I'm sure,
especially Mary,
I'm sure she's just
facepalming.
You know,
like someone
comes into heaven
like I got saved.
I used to be a Catholic.
You're not going to believe.
I know.
I already know.
I heard about it.
You know,
it's just,
it's crazy,
you know,
and you're like,
yeah,
they pray to you.
They call you
the Queen of Heaven.
She was like,
that's in the pie.
Like that's in the pie.
The Queen of Heaven
is not a good title.
And so
holy things and unholy hands
desecrates holy things.
But number two,
it doesn't improve
unholy things.
So when you place
holy things
in unholy hands,
it does not improve
unholy things at all.
Why?
Because again,
it's not reformation.
It's transformation.
Look what it says
in verse number three.
It says that
when they of Ashtod
arose early in the morrow,
behold,
Dagon was falling
upon his face
to the earth
before the Ark of the Lord
and it took Dagon
and set him in his place again.
So he was just coming
into the temple
and then like Dagon
is just removed
from his threshold,
falling flat on his face
right before the Ark
of the Lord.
Now obviously
you're going to see
in this chapter
that God has
a great sense of humor.
Okay,
because it's funny
because he's making
Dagon bow before him.
Right?
And these Philistines
are like,
well, that's weird.
I didn't feel any
earthquake last night
and then just kind of
set him back in his place.
Now,
what's funny about this
is that idols,
you know,
they need to be moved around.
You know,
they have all this supernatural power
to give you fertility
to bless your crops
but they can't seem
to move around on their own now,
can they?
And it just reminds me
of all these videos
of Catholics
that I see
where they're like
holding the Virgin,
Mary's idol
and they're like,
ha ha ha ha
and it just like
falls and it breaks.
It's like,
why isn't it floating?
Why, you know,
why did God
let that happen
to that precious idol?
You know,
they must need to be born.
They have no power.
So it falls over
flat on its face,
worshiping the Ark of the Lord.
It says in verse number 4,
when they arose early
on the morrow morning,
behold,
Dagon was fallen upon his face
to the ground
before the Ark of the Lord
and the head of Dagon
and both the palms
of his hands
were cut off
upon the threshold.
Only the stump of Dagon
was left to him.
You know,
it sounds like the Ark of the Lord
is not really helping them much.
It's not really improving
their quality of life at all.
So you know,
it falls the first time
and these priests
are just like,
that's weird.
They put it back up.
The second day they come,
it's fallen to the ground again
but it's decapitated
and maimed.
Okay?
So obviously,
what is God doing?
He's mocking
the gods of the Philistines,
removing their hands
and their head.
Just the stump is left.
And what is he doing?
He's basically telling these people,
hey,
your God is just wood.
A stump is just like wood.
Right?
Go to Jeremiah chapter 10
if you would.
Jeremiah chapter 10.
Jeremiah chapter number 10.
He's basically stripping away
the glory of Dagon
and demonstrating
this thing has no power.
I cut off its head,
removed its hands
and it's still bowing down
before me.
Look at Jeremiah chapter 10 verse 1.
Hear ye the word
which the Lord speaketh unto you,
O house of Israel.
Thus saith the Lord,
learn not the way of the heathen
and be not dismayed at the signs of heaven
for the heathen are dismayed at them.
For the customs of the people are vain.
For one cut at the tree
out of the forest,
the work of the hands of the workmen
with the axe.
They deck it with silver
and with gold.
They fasten it with nails
and with hammers
that it move not.
Now let me just say this.
This is not talking about a Christmas tree.
Okay.
You know, oh man,
that's why I'm a guest against Christmas trees.
But you should remove anything
that's carved of wood out of your house.
Okay.
Look what goes on in verse 5.
They are upright as the palm tree,
but speak not.
They must needs be born
because they cannot go.
Be not afraid of them
for they cannot do evil.
Neither also is it in them to do good.
Now, what is he talking about?
He's talking about the fact that these heathen nations
will cut out a tree
and essentially carve out an idol out of that tree.
In other words, it's just wood.
Wood hand stubble, so to speak, right?
Meaning it has no power.
So when God, you know,
decapitates Dagon, removes his hands
and just leaves the stump,
he's essentially demonstrating
to the Philistines,
you're worshiping wood.
It has no power.
It has no value.
It's just a piece of wood, okay?
It's a stock, as the Bible says.
Now, there's an important principle
that we see, go to Haggai if you would.
Haggai.
It's important principle regarding
putting holy things
next to unholy things.
Look at Haggai chapter 2.
What's the point here?
When you put holy things in unholy hands,
it never improves the unholy things.
A person has to decide, right?
You know, you put someone
in a fundamental Baptist church,
if they're not saved,
they're going to be made a reprobate eventually.
You put a goddess person
in an unsaved goddess person
into the house of God.
Guess what's going to happen?
Their heart is going to be hardened
towards the things of God.
They're not going to benefit
from the preaching of his word.
They're only going to become worse.
And look, folks,
the light of the glorious Gospel of Christ,
when it shines into the person
who's receptive towards the Gospel,
it benefits them, of course.
They get saved, right?
But a person who hates the truth,
they hate the Bible,
it blinds them.
It makes them a reprobate.
It corrupts them
because that's exactly
what the light of the truth does.
Look at Haggai chapter 2
and verse 11.
It says here,
let's say the Lord of hosts
asks now the priest
concerning the law saying,
if one bear holy flesh
in the skirt of his garment
and with his skirt do touch bread
or potage or wine
or oil or any meat,
shall it be holy?
And the priest answered and said,
no.
Then said Haggai,
if one that is unclean by a dead body
touch any of these,
shall it be unclean?
And the priest answered and said,
it shall be unclean.
In other words,
you know, when you put the ark of the covenant
in a foreign land
that doesn't worship the God of the Bible,
all you're going to do is make God mad
because you're desecrating it,
but it's also not going to improve
the land, right?
You know what?
This goes to show us that
when we are seeking to witness to people,
our friends, family members,
you know, you don't reach them by being like them,
okay?
You reach them by condescending to men of low estate,
but eventually you got to give them the gospel,
okay?
And you know, I know a lot of times people have a burden
for their friends, family,
and you know, this is one of the reasons
they stay in contact with these people
and I'm all for that,
but eventually
you're just going to have to break the ice
and actually give them the gospel
and if they reject it,
you need to dust off your feet and move on.
Why?
Because you as a holy thing will become desecrated
by the unholy thing
if you continue to spend time with the unsafe people,
okay?
And look, I'm a firm believer that
safe people,
the friends of safe people should be safe people.
I'm talking about like the closest friends
of safe people.
Obviously you're going to associate with people
out in the world
at your job
and your family, right?
But it's important to recognize
that you can't allow yourself to be influenced
by these people
and I do think it's a problem
when safe people have more in common
with unsafe people than with safe people, right?
Why?
Because eventually you will become defiled
and look folks,
the Bible obviously teaches us to be all things
to all men,
you know, but the Bible says
not without law unto Christ though.
So if you're trying to reach your friend,
you know,
you need to just be bold
and start just giving them the gospel
and just say,
hey, we're friends,
but I need to talk to you about this right now
because it's like burdensome on my heart.
Are you 100% sure that if you die today,
you go to heaven?
Oh man, don't bring that Christianity stuff.
You know, I don't like to talk about that with you.
Then we can't hang out no more then
because this is like the most important thing
of my life.
And you know what?
I want you to be saved.
So I want you to listen to this
and they're like,
well,
if you're going to be talking to me
about this stuff,
then I don't want to be friends
and be like,
Toodles,
see you later.
You know,
I'm not interested in having a relationship
with someone
who's not interested in the gospel.
Who's not saved?
And look folks,
it's better to just step out
in faith,
give the gospel,
and then your best friend gets saved
and he remains your best friend.
I mean, that's got to be one of the best feelings ever.
Right?
I've never experienced something like that,
but you know,
I've experienced instances
where I have extremely close friends,
just friends that I love,
friends that I've experienced life with
and they came to church,
they got saved.
Praise God for that.
Because I know I'm going to know this person
for the rest of my life
and eternal life,
amen?
But,
hold on a second.
You know,
don't allow your loyalty
to an unsafe person
override your responsibility
of being a Christian
and recognize,
well,
you know,
yeah, you're right.
Sorry,
I didn't mean to offend you.
I won't be a Christian around you then.
We'll just talk about other things.
You know,
you're a compromiser
at that point.
Be a man of boldness.
Be a person of boldness
of conviction
and have loyalty
to Jesus Christ
and recognize,
you know what?
We're best friends
and because we're best friends,
I'm going to give you the truth.
I'm going to tell you what the Bible says
on how to be saved
and I want you to be saved.
I want you to have eternal life.
Because here's the thing, folks,
if you're not willing to do that,
then you're a trashy friend.
You're not a good friend,
if that's you.
Well, I'm just willing to put my differences aside.
Oh yeah,
just let your friends go to hell, right?
Just let your friends
just spend eternity in hell
just so you can keep them as friends
this side of eternity.
So there's no division
between you and your friend.
That's garbage.
I rather risk offending my friends,
giving them the gospel
and potentially them getting saved
than just not telling them anything at all
just so I can keep that relationship with them.
You don't really love your friends.
You know, when I first got saved,
I had a lot of friends
and I brought them all to church
and obviously,
when I first got saved,
I didn't really know how to communicate the gospel.
I knew I could say that I got saved
and how I got saved
but I didn't really know
how to like systematically teach the gospel.
So what I would do is I would bring people to church
and have other people witness to them.
Some of my friends got saved
and some didn't.
You know, those who didn't
and wanted to keep contact with me,
I said,
you know where to find me on Sundays?
This is where I'm at on Sundays.
Sunday morning Sunday.
Yeah, but what about Friday night?
Friday night, I'm sleeping.
Not going out anymore on Fridays.
You know, if you really value my friendship,
you're going to have to come to church, you know?
And you say, how'd that go?
It didn't go very well, you know?
I had to get some new friends.
The point that I'm making here is that,
you know, placing you
in the midst of unholy people
doesn't improve them
unless you actually give them the gospel, okay?
And so that's important to know, you know?
And we need to learn
how to dust off our feet
when it comes to it.
You know, the Bible says,
give not that which is holy into the dogs.
Neither cast your pearls before swine
lest they trample them under their feet, the Bible says.
What does that mean?
It means they take it for granted.
They don't care what you have to say.
They're not taking these things serious.
And make no mistake about it.
I don't have any friend.
Listen to me.
I haven't had any friend since I got saved
who just can blaspheme the Lord in my presence.
It's not going to happen.
I'm not going to have some friend
just because we grew up together
just mocked the things of God
and I'm just going to kind of turn a blind eye to them.
Not going to happen.
You blaspheme my God.
You're done, bro.
First of all, you're getting a strong rebuke.
I'm going to correct you
and then you're done.
Either you apologize, you get saved
or we're just not talking again
because I'm not going to tolerate that.
You know, you shouldn't tolerate people blaspheming
your God in your presence,
mocking the things of God,
mocking Jesus Christ,
saying in all manner of evil.
And look, one of the reasons people do that
is because they want to see
if you're really about it.
You know, and if you don't say anything,
if you don't actually speak up,
they're like, oh, he's one of those.
You can say anything you want around him.
He's not going to say anything.
He's too scared to say anything.
You know, I don't want to be characterized as that
and I have no problem.
Listen to me.
I have no problem with making a conversation awkward.
Some blasphemes are like, hey, what is that?
You know I'm a Christian.
You know I believe on you.
Oh, I get all tight
because you're mocking my God.
You know, why don't you curse Allah?
Why don't you curse Buddha?
Why don't you curse the Mormon God?
Why you got to come after my God, right?
I'll tell you why because they test the waters
to see what they can get away with, okay?
And you shouldn't have friends around you like that.
The point being here is that
placing holy things in unholy hands
does not improve the unholy person.
It actually makes it worse for them.
And you know what?
God's not interested.
Listen to me.
God isn't interested in just reforming a person on the outside.
He wants them to believe the truth on the inside, okay?
Let's look down.
Go back to 1st Samuel, chapter 5, if you're already there.
Next we see here that when you place
holy things in unholy hands,
it actually ends up destroying unholy hands, okay?
So it doesn't improve it,
but it actually ends up destroying it.
Look at verse number six.
It's probably the best part of the story.
It says, but the hand of the Lord
was heavy upon them of ashtod.
And he destroyed them.
He said, how?
Did he like send down fire and brimstone?
Did he just like open up hell
and they just fell into hell?
Like what amazing thing did God do?
Did he smite them with madness?
You know, did he send locusts and lice?
It says he destroyed them and smote them with emeralds,
even ashtod and the Coaster of.
Now, what are emeralds?
Well, if you speak Spanish, I think it's emeroidus.
Emeroidus, is that right?
Okay, which means hemorrhoids.
Yes, you heard right.
So, you know, he's hitting them where it hurts.
Hitting them where the sun don't shine.
So think about this, you know,
and what an uncomfortable conversation
this must have been with everybody.
Because, you know, if someone has hemorrhoids,
they're not just going to tell people about it.
Right?
If they have hemorrhoids, they're not going to say anything,
but everyone has them.
And look, and here's the thing, like,
a lot of people in ashtod,
echron, and these regions,
there's people who are dying, okay?
So, he is killing some.
You know, he's kind of distributing the judgment.
Some are dying, but those who are not dying
are just being given hemorrhoids.
All right?
So, this is a lot of people just walking around all funny.
And eventually, someone's going to ask,
like, hey, you know, I got this problem.
I got it too.
And then everyone's like, I got it too.
You know, they can't sit down.
They can't sleep.
They got chub rub going on.
I mean, it's just like the whole nine.
Everything's just bothering them.
And you know what, God is just smiting them with that.
And I think it's absolutely hilarious.
I think it's so funny.
You know, the Bible's not boring.
Now, those of you who don't know what hemorrhoids are,
don't look it up.
And if you do, you know, get the AI version.
Don't click images, all right?
They're basically like sores in your privy parts, okay?
And you know, God is not just going to put one there.
I'm sure they got clusters of hemorrhoids there
to just make their life absolutely miserable, okay?
I think it's just funny.
I think it's hilarious.
You know, he's just, he's smote them with emeralds.
It's just, I mean, that's super painful, okay?
And there's no cream.
They could like apply, you know, there's no,
what are the creams?
God, I can't remember what they're called.
You know, there's certain creams out there that help with this.
There's nothing that exists out there.
There's nothing, they can't go to a doctor and it'll heal them.
This is God's hand against them to just make them miserable
just for desecrating the Ark of the Covenant,
destroying the people of God,
thinking that they could just add God to their plethora of false God,
just, you know, just completely desecrating the name of God.
Okay, I'm going to give you hemorrhoids, okay?
It says, when the men of Ashdod saw that it was so,
they said, the Ark of God of Israel shall not abide with us.
Listen to this.
For his hand is sore upon us, you know,
and upon Dagon of God, sore, right?
Yeah, it is.
He says, they sent therefore and gathered all the Lord's
of the Philistines unto him and said,
what shall we do with the Ark of the God of Israel?
And they answered, let the Ark of the God of Israel
be carried out about unto Gath,
and they carried the Ark of the God,
of the God of Israel, about thither.
And it was so that after they had carried it about,
the hand of the Lord was against the city
with the very great destruction,
and he smote the men of the city,
both small and great,
and they had emeralds in their secret parts.
So everywhere that the Ark of God is going,
it's like hemorrhoids, hemorrhoids, hemorrhoids,
everyone's just getting it.
It's hilarious, okay?
Look at verse number 10.
It says, therefore, they sent the Ark of God to Ekron,
and it came to pass as the Ark of God came to Ekron,
that the Ekronites cried out saying,
they have brought about the Ark of the God of Israel
to us to slay us and our people.
And they sent and gathered together all the Lord's
of the Philistines and said,
send away the Ark of God of Israel
and let it go down again to his own place
that it slay us not, and our people,
for there was a deadly destruction
throughout all the city.
The hand of God was very heavy there.
And the men that died not were smitten with emeralds
and the cry of the city went up to heaven.
Go to 1 Corinthians 2, if you would.
2 Corinthians 2.
The story is hilarious.
So, you know, they're all,
oh, victory, victory, yeah.
You can't jump up and down.
You can't sit down.
God is smiting you with one of the most uncomfortable
things that a human can experience
and everyone has it.
Now, what does this show us?
What shows us that, you know, God,
the Ark of the Covenant,
when people are right with God,
it's awesome, right?
Obedidum.
When he came to his house,
he was living it up.
His house was being blessed
and obviously, you know, the Bible's not explicit
at what kind of blessings he had,
but I'm sure his resources
quadrupled.
There you go.
His resources quadrupled.
I'm sure his crops were doing great.
I'm sure his wife was having a lot of babies.
I mean, he was just probably being blessed
because the Ark of God,
and he's probably like, hey, David,
take your time, you know.
I know you gotta come get it,
but, you know, just take your sweet little time,
you know.
He's being blessed.
Why?
Because he's actually obeying the Lord.
He's right with God.
He's a safe person.
It's blessing him.
It's helping him.
But here's the thing.
When the Ark of God is in the midst
of a crooked and perverse nation,
in the midst of a wicked people,
it's like a curse to them, you know.
And look, the way we can apply it is like this.
You know, a fundamental Baptist church
can be a curse and it can be a blessing to a place.
It can be a blessing to a place who wants the truth.
It can be a blessing to a place who wants the gospel,
who wants salvation,
but it can be a curse into those who hate the truth.
You know, when we started our church in Omani,
we were a blessing.
It was like the Ark of the Covenant
and the city of Omani.
It was great.
But then it eventually became a curse,
not because of us, but because of them.
Because they hated the truth.
We became a pain in their hindre parts, so to speak.
Right?
We became like hemorrhoids to them.
You know, it's just like,
oh, Pastor, he has such a pain in the, you know what?
He's a pain in the hindre parts.
He's like hemorrhoids.
Why?
Because that's exactly what happens
when you place a holy thing
into the hands of unholy people.
It'll eventually destroy them, you know,
because they hate the truth.
Look at 2 Corinthians chapter 2 and verse 14.
It says,
The Bible says here that, you know, God's people,
the knowledge of God has made manifest wherever they go.
Right?
Like, oh, you know, God is with this person.
This person is a Christian.
This person is a believer.
It says in verse 15,
You know, we affect both saved and unsaved alike.
People who want the truth, they love it.
People who hate the truth, they hate it.
We have this effect on society, right?
And in fact, look what it goes on to say in verse 16.
This is like, oh, I can't stand these people,
these Christians with their big families
and their marriages and their conservative values
and their biblical teachings and their doctrines.
It's like a saver of death and to death.
That's what salt does, right?
Salt in an open wound hurts.
But what is salt?
It's simply, when you place salt in an open wound,
it just exposes that there's an open wound there.
We didn't create the open wound.
We're just showing that there's an open wound there.
Right.
You know, when you go to a city and you preach against its sin,
when you preach against the nation, against the person,
if they start, it's because there's a problem there.
When I preach against feminism and you're like,
it's because you're probably a little feminist, right?
You know, if I preach against being effeminate,
you're just like, I don't mean you're being, there you go, right?
If I preach against fornication and you're squirming,
it's because the salt is irritating the wound.
If I preach against drunkenness, covetousness, idolatry,
and you're squirming, it's not the salt's fault.
Guess what?
It's the open wound that's in you of sin.
It's the open wound caused by sin, should we say.
And so Christians can be a saver of death and to death
and it goes on to say, and to the other,
the saver of life and to life.
You know, there's people who, you know,
they run into Christians, they meet churches, missionaries,
and you're like a godsend to them.
I mean, all of us have experienced this at one time
or another when we're out there preaching the gospel
and they're just like, man, I'm so thankful you came.
You're just like, you're like an answer to prayer.
And in fact, you know, I think it was this week
we were out souling and I was with my family
and, you know, we ran into some cholos.
And these are some like major cholos.
You guys know what cholos are, right?
Gangsters, okay, a few white people.
Mexican gangsters, okay.
And, you know, I'm talking about high socks,
you know, no ankle socks.
I'm talking about these were legit cholos, right?
But, you know, I'm not biased.
I'm not like, well, you know,
I don't want no cholos to come to my church, you know.
You know, I want them to come to my church
but I also want them to be saved though, right?
So I went up to them and there was like a group of,
I think it was like five of them
and some of them are young, some of them are older.
And I started giving them the church invite
and, you know, I was with my kids
and then I gave them the question.
They're just kind of like, they seemed disinterested at first.
But then, you know, and it's easy when people,
when you have a group like that, if they're disinterested
that you just kind of like move on.
You're just like, oh, I'm not going to waste my time.
But I just said, well, you mind if I just spend a couple minutes
showing you from the Bible
how you can know for sure that you're going to go to heaven
when you die?
And the oldest is like, do it.
I want to hear this.
All right, cool.
So I'm giving the gospel
and, you know, halfway through
like their countenance changes a little bit.
Where, you know, one of them, one of them, you know,
his eye kind of twitches a little bit.
It was just kind of doing one of these, you know.
I'm like, is he looking at me?
But he was just like, you could see the light bulb going on.
And especially when we talked about like eternal security,
he's just like, oh, okay, yeah, oh man.
You know, and they started softening up.
So make a long story short, they ended up getting saved.
You know, they called upon the name of the Lord.
They believed on the Lord Jesus Christ.
You know, they received Christ.
They received the forgiveness of sins.
And, you know, I spend a lot of time
talking about the fact that you don't repent of your sins.
You don't have to change your life to be saved
because, you know, you never know
if some of these guys went to like victory outreach or something.
You just got to assume sometimes, you know.
Because these cholo churches are often like
majorly repenting your sins.
It's a false gospel.
So you just got to, it's like the way,
when you approach a Jehovah's Witness,
you got to make sure they believe that Jesus is God, right?
So, you know, and I realized later,
I found out later, should I say, is that
the guy, the older guy who accepted the invitation,
he was actually the father of two of them.
Okay, and the other one was like a neighbor.
Now, four out of the five got saved.
The neighbor didn't get saved.
But I remember just talking to him and, you know,
he's kind of like finishing the verses.
And then, you know, he's like,
he's adhering to everything.
And his sons were adhering to everything.
They ended up getting saved.
And then at the end of the conversation,
you know, the dad said this.
He said, you're like an answer to my prayers.
Like you came here, like, it was the most profound thing
I've ever heard of cholosei.
You know what I mean?
You don't really hear all the cholosei
even speak deeply about stuff.
You know what I mean?
Like, he was just like, I saw blessing it.
You know, I don't know.
He was just like, you came at the right time.
Like, I feel like God made you come here right now.
And I was just like, yeah, it's true.
And I'm never, when someone tells me that,
I'm not like, no, no, no, no.
No, I'm like, yeah, that is true.
Because it is true.
We're a saver of life into life.
And he's just like, I feel like God brought you here.
Now typically when I'm out with my family,
we're a sight because I have six kids
and they're all very little.
But Bro had me beat though.
He's like, I got 25 kids.
I didn't ask him if it was from one or many.
I'm like, oh, you beat me.
And I say, I got six, but it's all from one.
But how did he view me?
He viewed me as someone who was a saver of life into life.
And I spoke to many people that day
who viewed me as a saver of death into death.
They rejected the gospel.
The point being here is that holy things
improves unholy things if that unholy person
actually hears through the gospel
and decides to get saved.
And so if we were to put that cholo inside of a church,
without salvation, it wouldn't help them much.
We'd probably make them really mad.
But now that he has salvation,
if you were to come to a Bible-believing church,
you would actually benefit from it.
Go back to first Samuel, if you would.
Here's my last point.
Point number one is that when you put holy things
in unholy hands, it desecrates holy things.
Point number two is that it doesn't improve unholy things.
Point number three is that it destroys holy hands,
meaning that the haemorrhoids come upon people.
They're just made miserable.
They suffer the wrath of God.
They end up getting destroyed because of it.
And point number four is that holy things
cannot be understood by unholy men.
And here's the thing.
The only thing that an unholy person
can't understand is the gospel.
But anything outside of the gospel,
anything else in the Bible, they cannot understand.
Meaning that unholy people
can't come up with solutions to spiritual problems.
Now look at verse one of chapter six.
And the ark of the Lord was in the country of the Philistines
seven months.
Dang, seven months, just haemorrhoids for seven months.
That sucks so bad.
No physical activity can be done.
And the Philistines called for the priest
and the divine are saying,
what shall we do to the ark of the Lord?
Tell us wherewith we shall send it to his place.
And they said, if he send it away,
if he send away the ark of the God of Israel,
send it not empty, but in any ways return him
a trespass offering, then ye shall be healed
and it shall be known to you
why his hand is not removed from you.
So they're just like, hey, we gotta figure out
how to get this thing back.
What should we do?
And the diviners and the priests are just like,
well, the most logical thing to do
is just return it back to Israel.
And then they're just like,
but make sure you send it back with an offering though.
Because we want to placate God here
because he's the one who's smiting us with this.
Don't read ahead, don't read ahead.
Everyone look up here.
Let me build up the story.
So they want to placate the God of the Bible
and so they're just like, send him a trespass offering.
So you're reading this and you're just like,
okay, these guys, they're coming up with a good solution here.
Look down at verse number four,
then say they, what shall be the trespass offering
which we shall return to him?
They answered five golden emeralds
and five golden mice.
According to the number of the lords of the Philistines
for one plague was on you all and on your lords.
Well, what?
So they're just like, so what kind of offering do you suggest?
Like a lamb offering, a drink offering
because I know the Israelites do stuff like that.
No, send them five golden hemorrhoids.
So you think of the goldsmith who's responsible for this.
I think about stuff like that,
like all right, we need you to make five hemorrhoids
and in case you need to know what it looks like.
Like what?
And then there's five golden mice
because we'll see later that basically
these cities were plagued with mice as well.
So on top of the deaths,
on top of the hemorrhoids is you also have mice rampant
and it's likely that if you have a large quantity of deaths
the mice are coming into what?
To eat the corpses.
Because that happens.
That's an actual thing.
So this is miserable.
So what a great idea, send it back with,
imagine being the Israelite who received that.
Like is this what I think it is?
Like are these hemorrhoids?
These fools are crazy.
But this is what happens
when you put holy things in unholy hands.
Holy things cannot be understood by unholy people.
You can't go to unsafe people for spiritual solutions.
What should we do?
Send them hemorrhoids.
Golden hemorrhoids.
That'll play K-God.
Golden mice, that'll play K-God.
It's the stupidest thing ever.
Oh man, I'm so sad.
What should I do?
Anti-depressants.
Oh man, I feel so sad.
What should I do?
Drink alcohol.
Smoke marijuana.
Do drugs.
Do anti-depressants.
Get medicated and you'll be fine.
These are worldly solutions to spiritual problems.
Oh this lady murdered her children.
What should we do?
Stick her in an insane asylum.
Or just give her life in prison.
These are not the proper solutions to the problem.
You can't rely upon, this is why it's nonsensical
to rely upon the government for anything spiritual.
To bring upon spiritual reformation.
You can't rely upon the president of the United States
to fix spiritual problems that doesn't work that way
because he's unsaved.
Yeah, he could bring reform to the land for sure.
Yeah, you know, leaders can bring reform to the land
but we need transformation, not reformation.
It's a spiritual problem.
You know, I've been reading a biography on J. Frank Norris recently
who is considered the father of independent fundamental Baptist.
He's a great guy.
He just did a lot of great works.
Pastor of two of the largest churches
that collectively made 25,000 in membership.
You know, did a lot of great works.
Fought against modernism and communism, evolution.
Unfortunately, he was a Zionist.
You know, he had a lot of problems in that area.
He actually even had C.I. Schofield to come preach for him.
And C.I. Schofield was largely responsible
for converting him to dispensationalism.
So he became a seven dispensation preacher
but then eventually because he was reading the Bible
he was like, this is stupid.
So he was just like, and then he started preaching
against C.I. Schofield and against the seven dispensations.
But he kind of still remained kind of like a preacher or whatever.
And you know, he did a lot of great works
but unfortunately one of the downfalls,
one of his weaknesses was that he thought
the way you can save America is through the political realm.
You know, just fighting off spiritual problems,
making sure we get the right person in the White House.
And you know, if we could just get the right person
with the right values, it's going to fix everyone's problem.
It doesn't work that way.
It's not going to work that way.
You're going to unsave people for spiritual solutions.
You might as well just make five golden emeralds at that point.
Five golden Trump statues or whatever
as if that's going to help, you know, it's not going to help anything.
You say, what's going to help the land?
I'll tell you what, preaching the gospel
and then preaching the Bible to those people
who have gotten saved, making them righteous people.
That's how you fix the land.
Okay.
The point being here is that, you know,
these people can't understand.
They're coming up with these weird solutions
to fix the problem.
And you know what? The natural man received it
not the things of the Spirit of God,
for they are foolishness unto him,
neither can he know him for their spiritually discerned,
unto the wicked he saith,
what is thou to do, you know, to take my covenant in thy mouth?
Seeest thou, hate its instruction,
and castest my words behind thee?
You know, the Bible is saying, you know,
we can't go to unsafe people
to figure out what to do spiritually.
We need to go to the Word of God.
Okay. You know, these guys don't know
what they're talking about.
They're coming up with weird solutions to these problems
and it's just not going to work at all.
And it reminds me of a story in Acts 19.
You guys remember the seven sons of Sceva?
Okay.
You know, the seven sons of Sceva
were these Jews who were exorcists
and they thought they can literally
exercise demons by just saying
like, I adjure you by Jesus whom Paul preaches.
In other words, it's like, come out of him
because we heard Paul talking about this Jesus
and we're just using it.
They're just kind of superstitious about it
and the demon was just like, well, Paul I know
and Jesus I know but who are you?
That's got to be like the worst thing to hear.
And then, you know,
the demon actually ends up whooping all seven of them
and stripping them naked
and they just leave naked.
It's just completely embarrassed.
It just humiliates them because, you know,
there are unholy people
trying to use holy things
as a way to accomplish something.
It's not going to work.
You're an unsafe person, you know,
you can't put a Bible in the hand of an unsafe person
expecting to learn anything from the Bible.
And by the way, this is why we should never learn
the Bible from Jews.
Especially from Jews.
Like they crucified Christ.
They take credit for crucifying Christ.
You know, and, you know,
but you expect to learn the Bible from,
well, we just got to get the cultural context from Jews.
They're going to lie about it.
You can't trust Jews
with biblical knowledge
especially if they've rejected the source of truth
which is Jesus Christ.
Now let's finish off here.
Look down at your Bibles at verse number seven.
It says,
Now therefore make a new cart
and take two milch kind
on which there hath not come no yoke
and tie the kind to the cart
and bring their calves home from them.
And take the ark of the Lord and lay it upon the cart
and put the jewels of gold
which ye return him for a trespass offering
and a coffer by the side thereof
and send it away that it may go.
And see, if it goeth up by the way
of his own coast to Beth Shemesh,
then he hath done us this great evil.
But if not, then we shall know
that it is not his hand that smote us.
It was a chance that happened to us.
So they basically send it off
by these milch kind.
They're sending the ark of God
and then later on we see that it goes by the narrow way, right?
It goes through a narrow pass.
And I believe what the Bible is trying to teach us here
is the fact that, you know,
in order to fix problems,
spiritual problems,
you got to go through the narrow way.
And what is the narrow way? Jesus Christ, right?
Like it's not through the haemorrhoids,
the golden haemorrhoids, the golden mice.
It's through the Lord Jesus Christ.
Solutions are through Christ alone.
You know what?
The Bible, Jesus Christ Christianity
has a lot that can benefit this world
even without Christ to a certain degree.
Because, you know, it just has so many beneficial principles
and valuable principles that people can learn from.
Nations have benefited from the residual blessings
that comes from just the Bible and Christians,
even if they're not the ones obeying it.
I mean, yeah, people in this nation
who are being blessed of God,
not because God is blessing them,
but because they're experiencing the residual blessing
that comes upon Christians within this nation.
But at the end of the day,
which of the Prophet, the man of the fish,
they shall gain the whole world,
lose their own soul.
And so at the end of the day,
they need Christ, right?
The solution is Jesus Christ.
The point being here is that
holy things in unholy hands
profits them nothing
if they don't go through Jesus Christ first, okay?
And you know what?
There's tons of people out there
who claim to be Christian,
claim to be saved,
don't have the right gospel.
And you know what?
They may be living just decent lives.
They may be successful in their business.
Why?
Because the residual of just the Bible itself,
the blessings of the Bible,
can benefit anybody's life.
But at the end of the day,
that soon shall pass.
And when that's over with,
the only thing that matters is what?
Is the soul and where it's going to go.
And so believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, right?
And then you can benefit from all the blessings
and realize that was a bad idea.
You know, five golden hemorrhoids.
Who thought of that?
Okay?
And here's the last point
that I want to make that I almost forgot here,
is that you have to understand
something about these unholy people.
You're like, oh man,
he's kind of rough, you know?
Just kind of criticizing the Philistines.
They just didn't know any better.
Well, the priest actually said,
didn't you hear what took place in Egypt
when God did this to the Egyptians?
That's hundreds of years before that.
So they're very much familiar with
the plagues of the Bible,
the works of God,
what he did to Egypt.
They knew all about that.
And still they said,
golden hemorrhoids,
that's the solution.
Why?
Because people without Christ are stupid.
Let's pray.
Father, we thank you so much for your word.
I pray that you would help us as your people
to recognize that we are a saver of life
and to life, death and to death.
And I pray that Lord,
you would help us to continue
to get more people saved.
Lord, that they would come
to the saving knowledge of Christ.
And recognize that the Bible can profit people.
Yes, it's true,
but only so far as
where they placed their faith in for salvation.
And I pray that you bless us
as we go on our way.
Help us not soon forget
the principles we learned tonight
in Jesus' name.