Speaker 1: Thank you for being here.
Speaker 1: My name is James Buntrock.
Speaker 1: I'm an associate pastor, part of the pastoral team here at Glorious Way Church, along with my wife, claire, and Jay and Selina on that pastoral team.
Speaker 1: Pastor Greiner's home this morning with Gladys, and this is a scheduled break.
Speaker 1: This isn't a surprise.
Speaker 1: This was on the calendar for a while and they're watching this morning.
Speaker 1: So they're here watching and it's my pleasure and privilege to get to bring you God's Word this morning.
Speaker 1: And so we're going to get started.
Speaker 1: The title of this morning's message is the Cost of Doing Nothing, and it sounds like a negative message, but there's hope in this.
Speaker 1: But there is a cost in doing nothing, and so we're going to begin.
Speaker 1: We're going to start out in the first chapter of Genesis and we're going to work our way all the way through Revelation and into the maps at the back, but we're going to skip over a few things in the middle.
Speaker 1: We won't cover it all this morning.
Speaker 1: How many know it matters where you go to church, and I believe that there is a pastor for somebody everywhere, and if you're looking for a church home, I encourage you to come and try out this place until you know one way or the other.
Speaker 1: We're not for everyone, but we are for some, and I don't believe that everyone who belongs here is here yet.
Speaker 1: So if you're watching on live stream, if you're looking for a church, if you're visiting this morning and looking for a church, if you're looking for a church, if you're visiting this morning and looking for a church, come here, come back again and here again until you know one way or the other and there's a supply for you somewhere and it's important for you to get there.
Speaker 1: But we're going to start in God's Word this morning.
Speaker 1: Genesis 1, verse 26.
Speaker 1: Again, the cost of doing nothing here.
Speaker 1: Verse 26, god said Let us make man in our image, according to our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish, over the sea, over the birds of the air, over the cattle, over all the earth and everything that creeps in the earth, over all the creeps.
Speaker 1: Pastor likes to say so in verse 27,.
Speaker 1: Over all the creeps.
Speaker 1: Pastor likes to say so in verse 27.
Speaker 1: So God created man in his own image, in the image of God.
Speaker 1: He created him male and female.
Speaker 1: Notice, there's no other sexes there.
Speaker 1: There's just two male and female.
Speaker 1: He created them and God blessed them and he said to them, be fruitful and multiply, fill the earth and subdue it, have dominion over it, over all those things that are in the earth.
Speaker 1: And the word subdue there in the Hebrew means to tread down, to conquer, to bring into subjection by force.
Speaker 1: So he said to subdue the earth, to bring it into subjection by force.
Speaker 1: So it's not a passive thing, it's an active thing.
Speaker 1: And then he charged us to have dominion, and that means in the Hebrew to prevail against, to reign and to rule over.
Speaker 1: And so God charged man in the very beginning to fill the earth, subdue it and have dominion over it.
Speaker 1: And there's purpose behind that.
Speaker 1: In Ephesians, chapter 2, verse 10, it says we are his workmanship.
Speaker 1: That In Ephesians, chapter 2, verse 10, it says we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works.
Speaker 1: And then it goes on to say which God had prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.
Speaker 1: We should walk in them.
Speaker 1: But people don't always walk in them, but we should.
Speaker 1: And God created these good works.
Speaker 1: He prepared these in the beginning.
Speaker 1: The works were prepared beforehand that all through history and all through time we should walk in them.
Speaker 1: Now there is a natural law.
Speaker 1: We can talk about spiritual laws.
Speaker 1: We can talk about natural laws, but there's a natural law of entropy that states that any system, when left alone, when left to its own without outside forces acting on it, will go from a state of order to disorder.
Speaker 1: That's the natural course of all of creation.
Speaker 1: It goes from order to disorder.
Speaker 1: A practical example of this, parents, is your child's room.
Speaker 1: Their room will always, without fail, move from order to disorder.
Speaker 1: It will never suddenly become neat all on its own.
Speaker 1: It takes an outside force, a great force, to act on that in a lot of cases to set things back in order.
Speaker 1: Structures deteriorate, buildings deteriorate, a car not used and maintained will fail.
Speaker 1: A garden not kept, weeds creep in, things come in and choke out the desirable things and it will stop producing the intended fruit.
Speaker 1: What about not showing up for work?
Speaker 1: You get fired.
Speaker 1: We've got chaos in our nation.
Speaker 1: We've got open borders right now.
Speaker 1: Open borders, chaos coming in.
Speaker 1: In some states you've got squatters that come in and a lot of these are the illegals that come in across our border illegally and then they come and find a vacant home, somebody who's not living and keeping it up, and they move in there and act like it's their own and they're squatters and in some states people are losing the right to their own home because they didn't keep and maintain and occupy that space and a squatter came in and took advantage of.
Speaker 1: And it's not right.
Speaker 1: You know, the laws are not right and just in that case.
Speaker 1: But the squatters suddenly have some kind of legal right to being there.
Speaker 1: If you let somebody come and live in your home without an end date on that, without a contract or an agreement, somehow they have a right to live in your home at some point.
Speaker 1: Some of the laws in some of these states are crazy and the squatters have more rights than the property owners.
Speaker 1: How many have seen what's going on on university campuses across the nation?
Speaker 1: The protests, the pro-Palestinian, anti-jewish.
Speaker 1: It's a demonic hatred of the Jews, of God's people, and you've got protesters coming in and occupying these spaces on campuses.
Speaker 1: And you know, where did a college student?
Speaker 1: You know, when I was in college I didn't have a lot to my name, I was just there.
Speaker 1: I had a meager supply, I barely had enough to make ends meet and I was there to learn and get through college, but somehow these college students have tents and sleeping bags and structures and things they're putting up out there.
Speaker 1: Where did that come from?
Speaker 1: I would venture to say that there's an outside resource that's funding some of this chaos on our campuses, and they're shouting from the river to the sea.
Speaker 1: Well, what you know?
Speaker 1: If you're pro-Palestine and you're pro that people, why does it require the river to the sea?
Speaker 1: Because they don't want Israel to exist, they want Palestine to occupy, and so we've got squatters.
Speaker 1: In that case, from the river to the sea.
Speaker 1: I like what the University of Florida did.
Speaker 1: They put out a notice and started handing these out on their campus, where they had a protest, and they said what was allowed and what was not allowed.
Speaker 1: There were three things that were allowed, and that was freedom of speech.
Speaker 1: You have the freedom to express your viewpoint and you have the freedom to hold a sign in your hand.
Speaker 1: And then there was a long list of things that was not allowed, and if there was a student or a faculty member that was found to be in violation of the things not allowed, here were the consequences of that you would be trespassed off the campus and that trespass, if you were a student, would be enforced for a period of three years.
Speaker 1: In other words, you don't get to attend classes there anymore, your tuition is gone and you are out, and if you're a faculty member, you'll be trespassed off campus and you no longer work there.
Speaker 1: So I like what the University of Florida did, but then there's a cost of doing nothing.
Speaker 1: In other places they're just letting this chaos run rampant, and there's a cost to that.
Speaker 1: You know, god did not put man on earth to do nothing and he also didn't come back and restore man, uh, for him to continue to do nothing.
Speaker 1: We were created with purpose and we talked about that purpose, but doing nothing.
Speaker 1: And I say that Adam did nothing.
Speaker 1: Satan came in, the great deceiver came in to deceive and there was the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, and God didn't want man to have a knowledge of evil.
Speaker 1: That was not for us to be aware of.
Speaker 1: He wanted us to have a knowledge of him, and that's it.
Speaker 1: And so when Satan came in and deceived, eve took that fruit and disobeyed God.
Speaker 1: But Adam had an opportunity to stop that, put a stop to that.
Speaker 1: But he did nothing.
Speaker 1: And so the act of doing nothing meant that there was a consequence of death reigning in the earth.
Speaker 1: Adam and Eve were charged to reign, rule and reign, but instead death.
Speaker 1: There was a consequence of death reigning in the earth.
Speaker 1: Adam and Eve were charged to reign, rule and reign, but instead death.
Speaker 1: There was a separation, there was a spiritual death that occurred and death reigned in earth.
Speaker 1: After that, in Romans, chapter 5, verse 17,.
Speaker 1: And I'm going to read this in the Amplified, if you can put that up Romans 5, 17.
Speaker 1: It says For if, because of one man's trespass, lapse and offense, death reigned through that one, it says standing with himself, reigning as kings in life through the one man, jesus Christ, the Messiah and the Anointed One.
Speaker 1: And so, through one man's offense, through one man's inaction, his laps, death reigned, but through the Messiah, the Anointed One, through Jesus Christ, we are in a position where we can reign as kings in this life.
Speaker 1: And you know that plan was in place from the very beginning and I said we were going to go from Genesis to Revelation.
Speaker 1: So we can go to.
Speaker 1: I'm just going to quote a piece of it Revelations 13, 18 says that the Lamb was slain from the foundation of earth.
Speaker 1: How was he slain from the foundation of the earth?
Speaker 1: Well, the plan was instituted in the beginning, in the foundation of this earth.
Speaker 1: God was not surprised by anything along the way.
Speaker 1: He had a plan and he instituted that plan from the very beginning.
Speaker 1: And so the Lamb of God was slain from the foundation of the world.
Speaker 1: In one move, jesus took upon himself the sins of the world.
Speaker 1: In one move, he took all the failures, all the plights of man and God.
Speaker 1: The Father turned his back on Jesus and abandoned him, and he suffered a torturous death.
Speaker 1: Jesus went to hell.
Speaker 1: But when payment was made in full, when it was complete, when the price had been paid in full, at that moment, you know, jesus is sitting there in the pit of hell, at the very bottom, demonic powers covering him.
Speaker 1: There's no life in there.
Speaker 1: And the devil thought I've got him now it's too late.
Speaker 1: It's too late for anything else to happen.
Speaker 1: How many know it's never too late.
Speaker 1: With God it's never too late.
Speaker 1: But the devil thought it was too late.
Speaker 1: He thought he had won.
Speaker 1: God is never too late.
Speaker 1: But the devil thought it was too late.
Speaker 1: He thought he had won.
Speaker 1: Poor dumb devil, he's so stupid.
Speaker 1: I just said that because that's a shout out to pastor.
Speaker 1: Poor dumb devil, he's so stupid.
Speaker 1: But when that payment had been made in full, when the price was fully paid, he started to twitch.
Speaker 1: There was a little bit of light.
Speaker 1: Oh, he threw off the demonic powers.
Speaker 1: He threw them off.
Speaker 1: Colossians 2.15 said that he disarmed principalities and powers.
Speaker 1: He made a public spectacle of them, and triumphing over them in it means he led a train of vanquished foes out of hell.
Speaker 1: He had them naked, stripped of their powers, disarmed completely and made a public spectacle of them.
Speaker 1: He didn't just win a little bit, he went over the top, he spiked the football in the end zone.
Speaker 1: He did a celebratory dance, he led a train out of hell and showed off through all of eternity and all of creation that the devil is a loser and that Jesus is the triumphant winner.
Speaker 1: And he ascended to heaven.
Speaker 1: Remember, he rose up and Mary caught him in the grave and he said don't touch me.
Speaker 1: I haven't fully ascended yet, I haven't fully gone up yet, I haven't completed this work.
Speaker 1: Don't touch me.
Speaker 1: What else was left to do?
Speaker 1: He was taking his blood that paid the price in full and presenting it to his heavenly father on the mercy seat in the holy of holies.
Speaker 1: And that blood speaks to our righteousness and our right standing with him from now through the end of time.
Speaker 1: We have a messenger in heaven speaking to our righteousness In Revelation again, the last book before the maps.
Speaker 1: There, in chapter 12, in verse 10, it called Satan the accuser of the brethren who accused them before God.
Speaker 1: Day and night has been cast down and it says and they overcame him.
Speaker 1: Who overcame the accuser, overcame the devil, by the blood of the lamb and the word of their testimony.
Speaker 1: By two things the blood of the lamb and the word of their testimony.
Speaker 1: And it was a complete work on his side.
Speaker 1: In other words, he had done everything required, everything necessary, to restore our right standing, to restore the original intent.
Speaker 1: But one thing was left undone.
Speaker 1: He did not come to fix all the trouble in the earth.
Speaker 1: He did not come to take the wheel.
Speaker 1: He didn't come to subdue and have dominion over everything in earth.
Speaker 1: Why?
Speaker 1: Because that was what we were charged to do in the very beginning.
Speaker 1: What he did was he came to restore the original condition.
Speaker 1: He came to make dead men live and to restore communion between man and God.
Speaker 1: What was original in the garden was a man and a woman right standing before God, who had communion with God, who were there to subdue and to have dominion to rule over and to have dominion to rule over.
Speaker 1: And so he restored that original condition.
Speaker 1: And now we add to that, according to Romans, chapter 5 that we just read in verse 17, we're to reign as kings in this life through Jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: We're to reign as kings in this life.
Speaker 1: In this life, I know, we're going to be king of kings.
Speaker 1: He's the king of kings and lord of lords and we're going to rule and reign with him.
Speaker 1: But in this life we are to reign as kings through Christ Jesus.
Speaker 1: And so we're back to the original intent Everything's fixed, we got blue skies, everything's perfect, everything's done and settled and we can breathe a sigh of relief.
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 1: Why?
Speaker 1: Because there's still a lot of people doing nothing and there's a cost to doing nothing.
Speaker 1: If left unchecked, it goes from order to disorder.
Speaker 1: So then we can say well, gosh, you know, he came back one time and fixed it.
Speaker 1: We need to call on Jesus to come back one more time and fix it again.
Speaker 1: Right, we need to put him back up on the cross and run him through that again.
Speaker 1: No, he had a complete work.
Speaker 1: How many think that it was good enough the first time what he did?
Speaker 1: What he did was good enough.
Speaker 1: In fact, it was more than good enough.
Speaker 1: It was an overwhelming, spectacular win the first time.
Speaker 1: So why do we have all this trouble?
Speaker 1: Hebrews 10, verse 12 and 13, it says that he had offered one sacrifice for sins.
Speaker 1: It says forever, one sacrifice, forever.
Speaker 1: And so one sacrifice forever covers everything that happened before then, all the sins up until that point, plus all the sins that would ever happen after that point.
Speaker 1: One sacrifice for sins, forever.
Speaker 1: And then what did he do?
Speaker 1: He sat down at the right hand of God and from that time he is waiting until his enemies be made his footstool.
Speaker 1: He's sitting there waiting.
Speaker 1: What's he waiting on Us?
Speaker 1: Don't beat me to the line.
Speaker 1: I get to say it first.
Speaker 1: Don't beat me to the line.
Speaker 1: I get to say it first.
Speaker 1: Look at Ephesians, chapter 5.
Speaker 1: Ephesians, chapter 5, and in verse 27.
Speaker 1: So this section of verses right here, 22 on down, is talking about marriage and comparing that with the church, likening the relationship of a husband and wife to that of Jesus and the church.
Speaker 1: And in verse 27, it says that he might present her who, the church to himself, a glorious church, not having spot or wrinkle or any such thing, but that she should be holy and without blemish.
Speaker 1: And so that's what Jesus is waiting for.
Speaker 1: He's waiting for that church to become holy, to become without spot, to become without blemish, the church that's supposed to be operating the way we were originally intended.
Speaker 1: And he is sitting there, waiting patiently until his enemies be made as footstools.
Speaker 1: And so who's going to do that?
Speaker 1: Again, it's us.
Speaker 1: We are charged to subdue, to take by force and to have dominion to rule over his enemies until he's got a proper footstool, until he's got a proper footstool.
Speaker 1: And time's running short, and so there is no time to do nothing.
Speaker 1: The cost of doing nothing is far too great, but I know that everything I'm talking about here works in time.
Speaker 1: In James 1, verse 4, talking about patience, let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfected and complete, lacking nothing.
Speaker 1: And so we need to be working on on the patience, on the enduring.
Speaker 1: Our faith needs to be growing, our knowledge of God's Word needs to be increasing, our spirit needs to be getting stronger and our action outside needs to be ever increasing until we reach that point where we are perfect and complete, lacking nothing, and his enemies are his footstool.
Speaker 1: So here's, let me give you an example of doing nothing, and this sounds a little bit political.
Speaker 1: This is not a political message this morning.
Speaker 1: This is reigning in life message.
Speaker 1: This is the cost of doing nothing in life, but it includes everything political and governmental, but it includes everything in your own personal life, in your home, in your relationships, all the way through.
Speaker 1: But here's an example of an effect, I should say of doing nothing In the Texas Capitol, in the House chambers.
Speaker 1: So this is where the state representatives meet.
Speaker 1: You've got the Speaker of the House that stands up front and center and he's conducting the meeting, but over his shoulder is a signboard, and that signboard has all the names of all the state representatives on there, and next to each name are three lights, and one light is green, which means that they voted for something.
Speaker 1: And then the next light is red, means that they opposed something.
Speaker 1: And then the third light is they call it present something.
Speaker 1: And then the third light is they call it present, they're voting present, I mean.
Speaker 1: In other words, I'm in the room and I clicked a button and so I'm here, but I didn't actually vote.
Speaker 1: I abstained from voting, I didn't take a position on this issue.
Speaker 1: Well, a vote to abstain or simply not voting how many know that we have an election going on right now and that we've got a runoff election going on a little bit later this month and that we're going to have a serious election in November?
Speaker 1: And there's a cost to doing nothing.
Speaker 1: There's a cost to not voting.
Speaker 1: So a vote to abstain or simply not voting has the same, the exact same effect as voting with the prevailing side.
Speaker 1: Whichever side, that is, whether it was all no's or all yes's, you effectively voted with the prevailing side.
Speaker 1: Whichever side, that is, whether it was all no's or all yes's, you effectively voted with the prevailing side in that case, by abstaining or not voting.
Speaker 1: And so let's do a little experiment here.
Speaker 1: So I want everybody over here in this left section you're going to be the eyes You're going to vote for this motion, and the motion on the table this morning is whether or not we're going to have barbecue for lunch after church, and so all in favor would say aye.
Speaker 1: And it's just this one section here to my left, and I want these two sections over here to my right to be the the nays.
Speaker 1: I want you to vote no on this one.
Speaker 1: You don't want barbecue, you want papacito's fajitas over here.
Speaker 1: Is it too early to start talking about lunch this morning?
Speaker 1: Maybe it is because we still got a lot to go, but so these two sections are the no's and this one section here for this example, is going to be the yeses or the I's.
Speaker 1: You're going to shout I and these two sections right here.
Speaker 1: I want you to remain silent.
Speaker 1: I don't care what you want.
Speaker 1: You're going to shout aye, and these two sections right here.
Speaker 1: I want you to remain silent.
Speaker 1: I don't care what you want.
Speaker 1: You're going to vote to abstain.
Speaker 1: You're not going to do anything.
Speaker 1: So all those in favor of having barbecue for lunch after church this morning say Aye.
Speaker 1: All opposed say Nay.
Speaker 1: Okay, the nays have it, the nays have it.
Speaker 1: But if you voted, you could have had what you wanted.
Speaker 1: Instead, all of you here voted with the nays on this side, because that was the prevailing vote, because you remain silent and you did nothing.
Speaker 1: And so if the prevailing vote is an evil one, you voted with evil by staying silent and doing nothing.
Speaker 1: That is not what God intended the church to do or how we're supposed to be.
Speaker 1: Let's look at Matthew, chapter 16.
Speaker 1: Matthew, chapter 16, and in verse 13 here Jesus asked who do men say that I the Son of man am?
Speaker 1: And so they said to him some say John the Baptist or Elijah, others said Jeremiah or one of the prophets.
Speaker 1: And he said but who do you say that I am?
Speaker 1: And Simon Peter answered and said you are the Christ, the Son of the living God.
Speaker 1: And Jesus answered and said to him blessed are you, simon Barjona.
Speaker 1: Flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but my Father, who is in heaven.
Speaker 1: And I also say to you that you are Peter or Little Rock.
Speaker 1: And on this rock, on this great rock, on this big stone, I will build my church, and the gates of hell will not prevail against it.
Speaker 1: What was the big rock?
Speaker 1: Well, peter's name means little rock.
Speaker 1: Jesus is making a play on words.
Speaker 1: He is not the Pope.
Speaker 1: Jesus did not build his church on a man, on that person.
Speaker 1: He built it on the rock, the big rock of revelation, knowledge.
Speaker 1: And what is that?
Speaker 1: The knowledge of who he is.
Speaker 1: Because Peter just had that recognition you are the Christ, the son of the living God.
Speaker 1: That hadn't been recognized before.
Speaker 1: God revealed that to Peter in that moment.
Speaker 1: And so on that rock of revelation, knowledge, he said I will build my church.
Speaker 1: Now, that word church right.
Speaker 1: There is not a church like we have here this morning an assembly of people in a building on a Sunday morning, singing praises and worship, having prayer time and hearing God's Word.
Speaker 1: That is not what he's talking about.
Speaker 1: Jesus could have used any number of words in that time, but up until that time I want you to think about that Up until that time, the church did not exist.
Speaker 1: There was not a church.
Speaker 1: There were Jews.
Speaker 1: They worshiped God, they went to synagogue, they went to the temple, they offered sacrifices, they studied his word.
Speaker 1: There was that, but there was not a church.
Speaker 1: And yet Jesus is saying I'm going to build my church on this revelation, knowledge of who I am.
Speaker 1: That word church right, there is a Greek word, and, and it's ekklesia, and it means legislative assembly or a political body.
Speaker 1: That's literally what it means.
Speaker 1: That, in the culture of that day, was referring to a group of people who met in the city square or met in the town gate, who made political decisions, governmental decisions, legislative decisions for the people that live there.
Speaker 1: They had the power to declare peace and to wage war in that assembly.
Speaker 1: Jesus did not use that word by accident.
Speaker 1: He said I'm going to build an assembly of people who have the power to make legislative decisions, governmental decisions, who have the power to declare peace and have the power to wage war.
Speaker 1: That's what he was saying to them.
Speaker 1: I'm going to build this.
Speaker 1: And it says the gates of hell will not prevail against it.
Speaker 1: How many want to be a part of what Jesus is building that the gates of hell will not prevail against?
Speaker 1: Okay, a few of you do.
Speaker 1: How many of you want to be part of what Jesus is building that the gates of hell will not prevail against?
Speaker 1: And that means we have to take our place and do our job.
Speaker 1: And so next verse, chapter 16, verse 19 there it says and I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven.
Speaker 1: What do keys do?
Speaker 1: They unlock things, they open stuff up, they give you access to stuff.
Speaker 1: He says I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven, and whatsoever things you bind on earth will be bound in heaven and whatsoever things you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.
Speaker 1: So those are two different realms he's talking about there.
Speaker 1: There's the earthly realm and then there's the heavenly realm or the spiritual realm, and doing one thing in one realm has a causal effect in the next realm.
Speaker 1: What you do in the earthly realm, what you bind on earth, causes a binding in the heavenly realm, and whatsoever things you eluse on earth causes a loosing or an allowing in the heavenly realm.
Speaker 1: Another way to say this is that we have the power and the authority to allow and disallow.
Speaker 1: You can also say that what you allow we'll have more of what we allow here in the earthly realm will be allowed in the heavenly realm.
Speaker 1: The problem is the church has been allowing things that it ought not and not stopping the things that ought to be stopped, and it's been happening for a long time.
Speaker 1: They've been doing nothing, and the cost of doing nothing is the trouble that we have in the earth today.
Speaker 1: It's the trouble we have in our nation, our state, our city today.
Speaker 1: It's the trouble that we have in the church today, because the church is not exercising its governmental authority.
Speaker 1: It's God-given authority, and yet he said I'm building something that the gates of hell will not prevail against.
Speaker 1: Yet he said I'm building something that the gates of hell will not prevail against.
Speaker 1: It's not too late.
Speaker 1: Jesus did not mention a middle ground anywhere in this.
Speaker 1: He did not give you an option to abstain or not vote or to sit silently.
Speaker 1: There is no middle ground.
Speaker 1: There is no room for a moderate in this is no middle ground.
Speaker 1: There is no room for a moderate in this.
Speaker 1: Remember the lukewarm, the hot, the cold?
Speaker 1: I would that you were hot or cold, but because you're neither hot nor cold, I will spew you out of my mouth because you're lukewarm.
Speaker 1: I have no purpose for you.
Speaker 1: You are disgusting.
Speaker 1: That's what he thinks of the middle ground.
Speaker 1: God is not a moderate.
Speaker 1: God is on his side, all by himself, and he has enemies that are on the other side and they're about to be his footstool when the church rises up and takes its rightful position.
Speaker 1: God is not neutral on any issue, on every issue that pertains to man.
Speaker 1: He has a side and we had better get on it.
Speaker 1: And then, once we get on his side, it's our job as the church to help other people get on his side and bring them to a point of decision.
Speaker 1: If they won't, they won't and we've got to move on.
Speaker 1: In Deuteronomy 30, 19,.
Speaker 1: It says I call heaven and earth as witnesses against you.
Speaker 1: I call the natural realm and the heavenly realm witnesses against you that I have set before you this day.
Speaker 1: In other words, I have a witness in the earthly and the heavenly spaces and I am putting a choice in front of you today, and the whole universe knows it, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and cursing.
Speaker 1: Therefore, choose life that you and your descendants may live.
Speaker 1: Joshua warned the Israelites.
Speaker 1: He said choose you this day whom you will serve.
Speaker 1: He was talking to the tribes of Israel who were maybe wavering a little bit, and he was saying you know, you can decide whether or not you want to serve the God of creation or the God that your fathers worship, the false idols that your fathers worshiped before.
Speaker 1: But he said as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.
Speaker 1: I'm taking my stand today.
Speaker 1: I will serve the Lord.
Speaker 1: You can do what you want.
Speaker 1: You can get on his side or you can go to hell.
Speaker 1: I don't care, but it's for me and my house.
Speaker 1: We will serve the Lord.
Speaker 1: And so choose you this day whom you will serve.
Speaker 1: Bible also says to give no place to the devil.
Speaker 1: Well, how many feel like maybe you got some chaos in your life, some things that are out of order, things that are in disorder, things that aren't working quite the way that they ought to be?
Speaker 1: I'm not here to condemn anybody, but we ought to self-examine and be able to look inwardly and recognize oh, I'm not ruling and reigning as kings.
Speaker 1: In this life, in this area, I've allowed some things that ought not be allowed.
Speaker 1: There's some deterioration over here because I haven't maintained and cared for something the way I should.
Speaker 1: And so we've got to self-examine.
Speaker 1: It says give no place to the devil.
Speaker 1: That means give no real estate.
Speaker 1: Don't give him any room in your life, in our society.
Speaker 1: Give no place to the devil.
Speaker 1: He walks about as a roaring lion, looking for whom he can devour.
Speaker 1: And what does it say about resisting him?
Speaker 1: If you resist the devil, he will flee from you.
Speaker 1: If you do nothing, he will devour you.
Speaker 1: That's the next connection, right there.
Speaker 1: Doing nothing means ah, I found one Now I can have lunch.
Speaker 1: He's looking for lunch.
Speaker 1: Are you going to be lunch for the devil?
Speaker 1: Okay, so we've got to do something.
Speaker 1: We've got to resist.
Speaker 1: We've got to resist in these spaces, in our body in our family, in our church, in our region, in our city, in our state, in our nation.
Speaker 1: All of these places We've got to guard.
Speaker 1: That means we don't sleep when we should be watching.
Speaker 1: When we're on watch, you know if you're the head of your house and head of your family, your job is to guard.
Speaker 1: That's one of your job descriptions.
Speaker 1: The job of a pastor one of the job descriptions is to guard the role of an executive figure in our government.
Speaker 1: One of the descriptions is to guard and to protect and to defend.
Speaker 1: And when they do nothing and neglect that, we have trouble and chaos.
Speaker 1: When you leave an open border for the devil to come across the border and squat in your territory, you have chaos and you have trouble.
Speaker 1: So the first step in guarding is to understand that God has a side and we've got to fear God.
Speaker 1: The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom.
Speaker 1: It says that I think about 14 times in the book of Proverbs.
Speaker 1: The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.
Speaker 1: In Romans 128, so we were just in Romans it says this and even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, think about that.
Speaker 1: They did not want to think about God.
Speaker 1: They didn't want to be aware of God, they were tired of hearing about God and even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, it said, god gave them over to a debased mind to do those things which are not fitting, to do, those things which ought not to be done.
Speaker 1: Verse 29, being filled with all unrighteousness, sexual immorality, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, full of envy, murder, strife, deceit, evil-mindedness.
Speaker 1: They are whisperers, backbiters, haters of God, violent, proud boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, undiscerning, untrustworthy, unloving, unforgiving, unmerciful, who, knowing the righteous judgment of God.
Speaker 1: In other words, they knew that God was righteous, they knew that God has a side, they knew what that side was.
Speaker 1: Who, knowing the righteous judgment of God, that those who practice such things are deserving of death.
Speaker 1: They even knew that they were deserving of death for doing those things.
Speaker 1: Not only do they do the same in other words, they continue to do those things but also approve of, applaud and celebrate those prideful celebrations of those who practice the same things.
Speaker 1: And how did they get there?
Speaker 1: Because they didn't retain a knowledge of God.
Speaker 1: They didn't like to retain a knowledge of God.
Speaker 1: You know, our school kids used to have a knowledge of God in their classrooms.
Speaker 1: Before the founding of this nation, when we had school rooms, the purpose of the school was to instill the love of God in those kids.
Speaker 1: Number one.
Speaker 1: Number two, it was to instill the love of country into those kids.
Speaker 1: And three, the love of family.
Speaker 1: Those three purposes was the purpose of school in the beginning.
Speaker 1: And why would you want to love your country more?
Speaker 1: Or first, in that order, before the family?
Speaker 1: You know, the family.
Speaker 1: Family, that's your blood, that's my kin, that's my folk, those are my people.
Speaker 1: I gotta you know, blood has to stick together.
Speaker 1: If you don't love your country, you'll neglect your country.
Speaker 1: If you do nothing to maintain your country, your country will become the enemy of the family.
Speaker 1: Now we have a country that is the enemy of the family.
Speaker 1: Now we have a country that is the enemy of the family because we didn't care enough about our country, didn't care enough about our nation to keep a knowledge of God in the forefront of our thinking.
Speaker 1: And now we've wandered off, and now people are turned over to a reprobate mind, to a debased mind, so that they would do those things which ought not to be done.
Speaker 1: The cost of doing nothing.
Speaker 1: Proverbs 4.23 says keep your heart with all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life.
Speaker 1: Out of your heart spring the issues of life.
Speaker 1: Keep your heart with all diligence.
Speaker 1: What does that mean?
Speaker 1: It means to value and protect your mind, will and emotions and your way of thinking, so that you can make godly choices and you don't invite the chaos and the disorder in.
Speaker 1: So you've got to number one guard your heart so that you have God's way of thinking on all these issues.
Speaker 1: Talking about the cost of doing nothing, we have the power to let and let not.
Speaker 1: We have the power to bind and to loose, to allow and disloose, both in the earthly and the heavenly realm, in the spiritual realm.
Speaker 1: And if we do nothing, the cost is great.
Speaker 1: And so we've got to guard.
Speaker 1: Like it said, we've got to guard our body and our mind.
Speaker 1: Guard your body, bring it into discipline and to under subjection.
Speaker 1: Paul said bring your body under subjection, in other words, don't let your body do everything that it wants to do, because there's a war between your flesh, this body, this suit, and your spirit.
Speaker 1: Your body doesn't agree with the things that are in god's word, but your reborn spirit does.
Speaker 1: And so you've got to guard and protect your way of thinking so that when you make a decision with your mind, it aligns with your spirit and not your body.
Speaker 1: And so you bring your body under subjection.
Speaker 1: If you have symptoms in your body, don't ignore them, don't let them stay, don't put up with it't tolerate.
Speaker 1: How much evil do you think God tolerates?
Speaker 1: He didn't tolerate any of the sin that was put on his son to the point of death and he turned his back on him.
Speaker 1: He won't tolerate it with us either.
Speaker 1: We ought not tolerate sin in our life.
Speaker 1: You know, jesus also died and took on himself our sickness, our infirmities.
Speaker 1: Okay, well, we got a hard line we're not going to tolerate sin, but we'll put up with some sickness and some infirmity in our life.
Speaker 1: That's just as wrong.
Speaker 1: Don't put up with that.
Speaker 1: Don't give place to the devil.
Speaker 1: Don't let that squatter stay in your body.
Speaker 1: Use your authority to bind and loose, to allow and disallow, and make sure you're doing the right things and not crossing the wires there and disallowing the right things and allowing the wrong things.
Speaker 1: Your mind.
Speaker 1: Let the peace of God rule in your hearts, which you were also called in one body, and be thankful.
Speaker 1: Let the peace of God rule in your heart.
Speaker 1: Don't let turmoil get in there.
Speaker 1: Don't let depression creep in there.
Speaker 1: Let the peace of God rule.
Speaker 1: Jesus said this let not your heart be troubled.
Speaker 1: That means that all the way through there there's a choice.
Speaker 1: You can let or let.
Speaker 1: Not.
Speaker 1: It's up to you.
Speaker 1: But he's saying choose you this day, whom you will serve.
Speaker 1: Today I set before you life and death.
Speaker 1: Therefore, choose life that you and your descendants may live.
Speaker 1: Choose peace on the inside.
Speaker 1: So don't let your body do what it wants to Bring it under subjection.
Speaker 1: These are all choices.
Speaker 1: Talking about your family, in 1 Timothy 3, verse 4, it says One who rules his own house well, having his children in submission, with all reverence, for if a man doesn't know how to rule his own house, how will he take care of the church of God, the governmental assembly of God, the ecclesia of God?
Speaker 1: If you're not ruling your house well, how can you be part of what Jesus is building that the gates of hell won't prevail against?
Speaker 1: How can you do the bigger thing if you don't first take care of the smaller thing, your family, he who rules his house well, and his children in submission, with all reverence, your children ought to be raised up to revere their parents, to honor their father and their mother.
Speaker 1: Why?
Speaker 1: It's the first commandment, with a promise that it might go well with them.
Speaker 1: And so we train our children.
Speaker 1: It says to train a child in the way they should go.
Speaker 1: When they're old they will not depart from it.
Speaker 1: You know, training is not free-ranging.
Speaker 1: Training is not allowing your kids to do whatever they want.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about the marriage first, then we'll get to the kids.
Speaker 1: Talking about ruling your house well and not allowing disorder to come in or experiencing the cost of doing nothing in your family.
Speaker 1: Talking about marriage In no place in God's Word does it say that one spouse has the power or the right to dominate the other one.
Speaker 1: There's two different roles for the husband and the wife, but neither one is to dominate over the other one.
Speaker 1: They just have different roles.
Speaker 1: One is not less important than the other.
Speaker 1: They're co-heirs in life, they're joined together and they become one, but they have two different roles.
Speaker 1: And so in Ephesians 5, it says that a wife is supposed to submit to her husband as the head of the household, the same way that Christ is the head of the church and the church is supposed to submit to the head of the church.
Speaker 1: We submit to Jesus and he's using that comparison.
Speaker 1: A wife is supposed to submit to her husband in that way and he's using that comparison.
Speaker 1: A wife is supposed to submit to her husband in that way.
Speaker 1: In other words, a wife is supposed to, just like the church, respects and honors and serves our Lord and Savior, jesus Christ.
Speaker 1: The wife is supposed to respect and honor and care for and serve her husband in his role and not work against him in that role.
Speaker 1: Well, what's the role of the husband?
Speaker 1: To love the wife, even as Christ loved the church and gave himself for her.
Speaker 1: In other words, the husband is supposed to put his life on the line and to give up his life for the wife and gives up and sacrifices his own interests to enhance hers, to cherish her, to support her and to attend to her needs, to provide protection and a safe place.
Speaker 1: Two different roles, equally important, but one doesn't dominate over the other.
Speaker 1: They don't get to live separate lives and do what they want.
Speaker 1: They're not roommates.
Speaker 1: If you're in a condition of roommates, you know where's the covenant, where's the original covenant, where's the original condition there?
Speaker 1: That's the cost of doing nothing when you just become roommates, and now you've got chaos there and it's not too late.
Speaker 1: The good news is it's not too late.
Speaker 1: The good news is we have authority to rule and reign in this life.
Speaker 1: As kings talk about children, now train up a child on the way they should go Proverbs 22, 6, and when they're old they will not depart from it.
Speaker 1: No place in God's word says that we're supposed to let our children raise themselves.
Speaker 1: Tell me what age is appropriate for a child to choose what brand of cigarette to smoke, or maybe what brand of whiskey to drink?
Speaker 1: At what age is it appropriate for a child to choose what sex they would like to be?
Speaker 1: And I say sex because there are only two sexes.
Speaker 1: There's male and female.
Speaker 1: We read that in the beginning of this message.
Speaker 1: This mess about genders is a made-up thing.
Speaker 1: It's chaos.
Speaker 1: It's the result of parents doing nothing and letting this come in.
Speaker 1: How about an animal?
Speaker 1: What animal do we let our child decide that they should be Children?
Speaker 1: Are?
Speaker 1: They call them furries?
Speaker 1: I know it sounds kind of funny and goofy, but they literally.
Speaker 1: It's a demonic influence right there that influences their little mind.
Speaker 1: Some parent let that demonic thing come in their home and did nothing and allowed this to come in, allow it to grow, allow it to fester and allow their kids to get so far off that they're gone.
Speaker 1: Your kids are not animals.
Speaker 1: They are male or female.
Speaker 1: They are made in the image of God and they are precious in His sight.
Speaker 1: They're also a blessing of the Lord.
Speaker 1: But there's no place in God's Word that says that we ought to do nothing with our kids.
Speaker 1: It also doesn't say that we should turn them over to a government institution to raise our kids.
Speaker 1: The government institution is not qualified to do what the parent is charged to do.
Speaker 1: That's out of order, that's chaos.
Speaker 1: That's the cost of doing nothing.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about the church.
Speaker 1: Do you love your church?
Speaker 1: Then protect and defend your church.
Speaker 1: You can't very well receive from your pastor.
Speaker 1: If you don't trust your pastor, if you dislike something that he said and disagree with it and you're disagreeable, and then you start talking to other people and help them become disagreeable, you're poisoning your own well, and then you're starting to hear other things that aren't right.
Speaker 1: Why?
Speaker 1: Because you let the devil come in between that relationship and you start hearing things in the negative, in a negative way, and you're not able to receive anymore.
Speaker 1: And so protect and defend your church.
Speaker 1: Pray for your pastor, pray for our family, pray for this church.
Speaker 1: You have a vital role to play in that.
Speaker 1: In Jude, chapter 3, and there's no chapter in Jude, verse 3, it's just one chapter, very short book, just before Revelation, jude 3, it said Beloved.
Speaker 1: While I was very diligent to write to you concerning the common salvation In other words, we got this salvation message and I've been diligent to talk about this I found it necessary to exhort you and to contend earnestly for the faith which was once delivered to all saints.
Speaker 1: For certain men have crept in unnoticed who long ago were marked out for this condemnation, ungodly men who turned the grace of God into lewdness and to deny the Lord God and our Lord Jesus.
Speaker 1: So certain men have crept into the church at large and you've got woke churches and dead churches.
Speaker 1: There are churches listed in Revelation in various forms of decay and we have those today because we let that creep in.
Speaker 1: There was a cost of doing nothing and allowing this to come in In our region, in our city, in our state, in our nation.
Speaker 1: The Great Commission said to go into all the world, but it starts with Jesus saying all authority in heaven and earth has been given to me.
Speaker 1: And then he delegates it to you and says go into all the world, preach the truth, tell everyone about this gospel, tell them about my ecclesia, tell them about how we're supposed to rule and reign in this life as kings.
Speaker 1: And so then we, as Christians, having this delegated authority, then turn around and delegate our God-given authority to somebody in a governmental position and expect them to do right by it.
Speaker 1: And when they don't and we do nothing and we choose not to vote, we let evil, we let the devil creep in.
Speaker 1: We end up with an unrighteous government, we end up with a model where there's chaos and evil reigning, death reigning in this life when we should be reigning as kings in that life, in that area of our life.
Speaker 1: And so we've got to restore righteousness in our government.
Speaker 1: Benjamin Franklin, at the first constitutional convention, said, without his concurring aid, talking about God and prayer, because they hadn't yet prayed.
Speaker 1: He said without his concurring aid, without God's continual help, we'll succeed in this political building no better than the builders of Babel.
Speaker 1: And I look out in the world today and I see Babel.
Speaker 1: And Babel is a sure sign of man trying to do something without God's help.
Speaker 1: And yet in a lot of cases, people are real fond of calling on God.
Speaker 1: God, please help us, give us wisdom, help us to govern, help us to do this, help us to do that.
Speaker 1: God will never help you do anything that violates His Word.
Speaker 1: God, help us do this.
Speaker 1: We've got to broaden our tent.
Speaker 1: We've got to make room for the LGBT, because you know they're voters and they vote with us on fiscal issues and on other issues and freedom issues.
Speaker 1: I know it's this one God will never help you do anything that violates His Word.
Speaker 1: There's no room for that.
Speaker 1: There's no time for that.
Speaker 1: We can't let these things continue.
Speaker 1: We can let or let not.
Speaker 1: We can bind and loose or we can allow and disallow.
Speaker 1: In the heavenly and the earthly realm, we have been restored to the original condition.
Speaker 1: You are all able ministers of the gospel of Christ.
Speaker 1: You have been empowered and authorized to rule and reign as kings in this life.
Speaker 1: You have the keys to the kingdom of heaven.
Speaker 1: You can bind and loose in your home, in your family, in your body, in your mind, in our region, in our city, in our state, in our nation.
Speaker 1: And we have a purpose to fill the earth, to subdue it, take it back by force and have dominion over it.
Speaker 1: Our purpose is to reign in life as kings through Christ Jesus, and there is no more time and the cost of doing nothing is too great.