Saying was built in by God and we noticed that Because of the rejection of God's Word in the rejection of God That when God came in God placed The divisions there. We're reading from Isaiah the 26th chapter In the fifth through the sixth verse where it says for he bring it down them that dwell on high the lofty city he layeth it low he layeth it low even to the ground he bringeth it even to the dust the foot shall thread it down even the feet of the poor in the steps of the needy y'all remember that I was talking about yesterday is that the battle is the Lord's but we the instruments in this battle and he's raising us up to shine as stars and as lights and That's what he's wanting to be glorified in the earth, and that's why I say as his saints, as God glorifies us with positions, authority, material things, whatever we have that brings glory to God and God exalts us, God wants us to be giving him the glory in this, but be a shining light, a beacon as the sons of God. As we grow and increase in God, God wants us to be like Job. That's the example with Job, because when Job was walking in the earth, he says, Have you considered my servant Job? He pointed Satan at Job. Because Satan, he wanted Satan to throw everything at Job, but he said, that's not like Job. How would you like God bragging on you then? You're that faithful to God, no matter what come on your job or what come in your life or whatever. All you got, you will give God, He is first. God gives his first no matter what he gets. He's a jealous God And he gets to praise the honor the worship your wife your children Nothing comes before God and he took it Seemed like he took his wife because he gave mother children and the wife should have been pretty old at that time seemed like he gave him double the amount of kids, because he already had seven sons and three daughters, but he gave him seven more sons and three daughters. Why? It's because Job was braggable, because he was an upright man, a just man, one that is thrown even. In other words, he stood up against his friends. He told his friends, and that's why I say, We have to be able to tell people where to get off and get on, and we have to thread on people. He didn't let his friends come in there and walk on him and make him feel miserable about himself. Sometimes people make you feel miserable about yourself, but God says there's no condemnation to those that are in Christ Jesus. Why should you let somebody else make you feel sad or feel bad? He had given us the dominion. In the book of Genesis, he says, the third chapter, The Lord God said to the serpent, because you have done this, you are cursed more than all the cattle. Well, he came that with some of his fast talking and his deception. He fooled the weaker eat vessel, which was Eve. He didn't confront Adam head on. He worked Adam through his wife. But Adam being weak and yielding and listening at his wife, that's why God said, because you've listened at your wife, the reason I'm doing this. You listen at your wife and done what I told you not to do. Because he wanted a strong, braggable man there and Adam wasn't that, not for his Adam. Adam wasn't that and he didn't have that discipline. But he told the serpent, and that's why I say a lot of times that people are just beguiling us and do all this. God's gonna bring them down. And if we don't do what God says do when he brings them down, we're complicit in their wickedness and evilness. We shouldn't love what God hates. The people that God hates, we shouldn't love. Those that work in niggardly and wickedness and crookedness and all these things, we shouldn't have a deep association with those people. and most of the time when he's talking about the wicked, he's talking about religious people or people that know God and know of God because the heathen, those that don't know God and don't know about God can't really talk against God or talk about God. They don't know God. You have to know something kind of of a person before you do this and that's why I say your most dangerous people are the ones within religion. That's why this church time, that's why during this time here, this is the most dangerous time it is is in the end times. This is when we have to be studied up. It says perilous times shall come in these latter days. And those that depart from the faith, we have to be careful of wolves in sheep's clothing. The ministers of life says, and more than any animal of the field, on your belly you shall go, and thus you shall eat in all the days of your life. I will put enmity. The word enmity means open hostility. It's positive and it's active and it's typically mutual hatred or ill will toward each other. It's bad if you have that in a marriage and that's why you see some people divorce and they cite irreconcilable differences. That they can't come to agreement, they can't come to a mutual thing and that's what he did when God puts enmity between something. He distances himself because they're different, and they can't become the same. They're not to be the same. They could deceive one another. People could marry or save their friends or do things or whatever. But there's enmity there. And that's what he did. That was the seed of the devil and the seed of the woman that he put an enmity there. hostility that's why when some people say that your friends are they this or somebody you know that's why I say well your enemies could be those of your own household you think you know them you think these things and that could be your biggest problem but it let me give you some synonyms for the word enmity it says animosity antagonism and you know sometimes you know Relatives of people antagonize you too much. They bother you. They get on your nerves or whatever. Entropy, bad blood, bitterness, gall, or grudge, jaundice, or rancor. Animus means deep-seated dislike or ill will for someone or something. suggest positive hatred, which may be open or conceal. And a lot of it today is concealed enmity. You'll never win these people as your friends. They'll never be your friends, no matter what you do or what you give them. They'll turn and trot you on the foot. That's why it says, give that which is holy, not unto the dogs. It's an unspoken enmity, the concealed enmity, which most people face today. Hostility suggests that enmity is showing itself in a tax aggression. hostility. It seems like sometimes your children has an open hostility towards you. It looks like everything you do, they have something to say against it or that you're wrong in it. They're criticizing. They'll never promote you or helping you or behind it, but they seem hostile to you. Your ideas or the things, the way you do certain things, anything you do, It has an antagonism or hostility shown in there. Antagonism implies a natural or logical basis for one's hatred or dislike. Antipathy suggests repugnance or desire to avoid or reject. We have that in political circles where a lot of people was antagonistic toward Barack Obama as president. And then there was a lot of people that was antagonistic toward Donald Trump as president. Antagonism suggesting a clash of temperaments leading readily to hostility. A natural antipathy for self-seekers or between the brothers or whatever. Animosity suggests intense ill will and vindictiveness that threaten to kindle hostility. Animosity leads to revenge a lot of times. And Joseph's brothers had a lot of animosity and hostility in them. We don't know if they were ever converted or whatever. But we know that they were murderers, a lot of them, because of what they did to the three older brothers to what they did to the man that raped Dinah or whatever. So when they said they wanted to kill Joseph, they actually would have killed him. They really meant that. But then Judas come up with the idea to sell him into slavery instead of killing him or whatever. So you have these things, and like Cain rose up and killed Abel, that Absalom wanted to kill his father David. But we have these different things within people or whatever. So a lot of people tell me, well, we can win the devil over or whatever. I doubt that. God had placed enmity between the two seeds of the two people. That's why we can't come to God. That's why there's animosity and that's why It says that he's the truth and the way and the light. Jesus Christ had died to reconcile us to God. He bridged the gap. There was enmity. There was a division. We couldn't get back to God. There was no way to God except through the blood of Jesus Christ. We have to be in Christ. We have to be clothed in Christ. We have to put on Christ. through the obedience of Jesus Christ, His righteousness is how we get to Him. So that's why I said that's what we watch full of, the things and the people of the world and the schemes and the devices of the devil because there are so many people and I think it's not much as dangerous if you know somebody openly dislike you or that y'all against one another, antagonistic, this person is antagonistic towards you or they are unbeliever. It's not as bad. If somebody's prejudice or hateful or whatever, it's not as bad because you know that. If it's a rattlesnake over there or whatever, you understand that, you know, that y'all are enemies. You understand what I'm saying? But it's much more dangerous when the enemies are the one you married to. It's the one you're sleeping in the bed with. It's much more dangerous when it's your brothers and sisters. It's much more dangerous, more people die from friendly fire than most other things in warfare from friends. And friend, me and Mr. Parker talked about an hour yesterday evening. It's your friend. Nowadays people don't have, friend is not defined the same way nowadays as it used to be. Most men don't have a lot of men friends because most men don't understand what the word man stands for. Most men have dropped down the level, and that's why it says there'll be few men. And the women are on the uprise or whatever, but it's going to be very few of them also. So let's not make this gender specific or whatever. But that's why God stood there. He says, I will put in between. And that's why you have the wheat and the tares. He said, allow them to grow together. Well, I ought to weep and tear together, but know that you're in a dangerous world. It is very dangerous out there. It's a jungle out there, as they say. I'll put enmity between you and the woman and between your seed and offspring and her seed. He shall, in other words, the word bruise your head, that's back terminology in those days of whatever, bruise your head. In other words, he go mortally or fatally wound you. A death blow was delivered to the head. In other words, Jesus put the death blow to Christ. He defeated the grave. He defeated death. He had put it under his feet. The same way we should defeat the devil, the same way he had given us power to do what? Thread on serpents and scorpions and these things can't harm us. So we don't have any really a reason to fear. We only fear and reverence God. So that's why we can go wherever God directions and leads us, because he's with us where we go. That's why Moses said he couldn't go in the wilderness if God didn't go with us. I don't want to go into the bathroom if God doesn't go with me. I may not come out of there. If God's not with me, I don't want to be driving on the highway or whatever, because that's a dangerous place to be, Christ in us and with us. He says, and the Lord says, you shall bruise his heel. He is going to deliver entrapments to you, and you may fall or whatever. But it's not dead. It's going to be on the path that you walk. And you had a few dreams and things about you being surrounded by snakes and different things. I don't know if I told you, I didn't know the interpretation of it. But I had some inclinations about it that I kept to myself. But it wasn't an interpretation from God. But it may be, I don't know, it may be something you ate or some other thing, but it may be pertinent, so I wouldn't dismiss it. You'd like to smile and laugh about this. This is a very serious thing. I don't know how serious you take this thing. But it could mean something, and that's why Joseph said only God could give an interpretation of him, and Daniel always prayed to God. for interpretation of a dream whether it meant something. Apparently Nebuchadnezzar probably had many dreams but he realized that this dream meant something and it could be very dangerous and that's why your parents and older people a lot of times things people say or do. There's certain things that they say, well, you take with a grain of salt. But there's certain things, like Mary, when Jesus said that, did you know I have to be my father's witness? Well, she kept that saying there, because words matter. What you say or whatever you do. That's why it says we have to give account for every idle word, because people remember words. They're very powerful. The power of life and death lies in words. And the Lord said, and the serpent, because thy has done this day, cursed above all cattle and above every beast. So after he gave us dominion and authority, we should walk therein. We should walk in that dominion and that authority. With Job, I told you I would bring that verse with me today. out of the amplified version in the book of Job the 40th chapter in the 12th verse where he says, he says, look everyone who is proud and humble him, and if you are so able, thread down the wicked it where they stand. If you are able, throw it down the wicked, where there stands everyone that are able. See, we are to be delivering that death blow. You remember when Jesus and the Pharisees, He didn't pull no punches with them. The Pharisees that confronted Him, He gave them the Word of God. He gave them the Scriptures, the powers in the Scriptures. That's our sword. That's what we should practice, wielding that Word of God. That rod of iron, that can break anything in pieces. There's nothing more powerful than the Word of God. That cuts. That cuts to the bone and to the marionette, to the cutting of the Son of the Spirit. You can take all the wind out of somebody's spirit with the Word of God. And that's what it tells us here, and that's what Job is. That's why I said we don't take this thing lightly. When you get into, when God births you or born you again, that's why you stop talking so much and you don't handle words and just pop off and say things openly or just run your mouth because you know there's power in the words you're saying. You don't give a lot of vain or loose talking or whatever. Your lifestyle changes. The Holy Ghost start browning your tongue. that's one thing about christian people because you analyzing you judging everything everybody do he that is spiritual judge at all things and if you're not in a spiritual state you walking around here in a physical state that is very dangerous that's what i say is very dangerous because god As he births us again, he causes us to walk circumspectively. So that's why there are some that shall thread up on serpents, thread up on scorpions. But there are other people within the church community, within the church, that could get you in deadly trouble because they take this as a game. You know, it's a lot of people running around here rebuking the devil and saying all this. These are new Christians, or Christians that really aren't born again, that don't know how serious Christianity really is. See, once you make a vow to God, you don't take that vow lightly. You start taking everything you do very, very seriously. And that's why he told Peter about the fig tree. I went over yesterday in the book of Mark, the 11th chapter and the 20th verse, when Jesus cursed the fig tree. And he asked Peter, Peter says, the tree that you cursed the other day, it had died. That's because he wasn't like Peter. You remember Peter was always popping off at the mouth, hurrying up saying something, having to retract what he said. And he just would say things. And that's a lot of people say things, you know, just get this religious high and start preaching or teaching or saying things. And people are taking note on that. Satan is taking note on that. so the false prophets will have to deal with those things that they say that's why i say you have to give account for every idle word you say now if you're standing up preaching or teaching this you didn't cross the line with satan here and unless you had made a deal with him He's gonna make you give account of those words you spoke and some Christians could pull and try you on that That are you a servant of God? Let me test you in this area. Let me test your Christianity or whatever Jesus is gonna allow that God's a lying that that's why he told Peter. He says Satan had asked could he serve you as wheat? He said I didn't pray the prayer for you that your faith not fail. I Peter got so disappointed and disturbed and everything. He was running his mouth with the maidens and everything. He had cursed, saying he never knew Jesus and he said he was going back fishing or whatever. Paul knew not to travel. Remember they had this division because Paul said he wasn't going to take John Mark with him because John Mark had left on the journey. It was dangerous to be with Paul. Paul was a staunch Christian. Paul was a strong Christian, and it would put your life in jeopardy. And we see where a lot of true preachers and true teachers nowadays, they're dying for the name of Christ. But to a lot of people, it doesn't matter to them. They make vows and deals to God. It doesn't matter to them. You understand that? They don't take God seriously. They say things, not realize God says, it's better not to make a vow than make a vow and not keep it. So that all comes with dominion. He's not going to give a person like that authority and power. And Peter didn't realize that until after Christ was dead, when Christ was sitting down there and said, Peter, do you really love me? And he asked him several times that. But in the conversation he was talking with Peter in the book of Mark about the fig tree, though, he said, Peter, how would you like to have those things that you say? How would you like to be able to speak to this mountain and say, be moved and cast in the sea, and it would obey you? Now, who would go speak to a mountain and tell it to go be moved in the sea like he was speaking in hyperbole or whatever it was? Allegory of saying they're mounting the problems any troubles anything that you come against or come up against you as he told Joshua, but that we shall no man able to stand before you There's no problem too great for God to conquer us for there's nothing too hard for the Lord Through Christ all things are possible So that's what he was meaning, Peter. But Peter, you have to start watching what you say. Because what you say in some areas weakens you in other areas. It causes problems. A lot of times your actions and things which you do does cause problems. You have to keep your eye on the ball. Keep your eye focused upon Jesus Christ. Because those times in life when you take your eyes off Jesus Christ, those are the times you begin to sink. So we see God had given us that power. And then he also said that we should do greater things. He says, because I go to my father, that we in this time and era, and I don't know how hungry some of us are or whether we're really wanting to do greater things or do larger things than others have done or do we really want to please Christ and show him what desires and inclination he's putting in us or whatever. That zeal or that spirit that ever increasing faith is going to be up to the individuals that God had given each man a certain measure of faith. And he increased that through the deeds done in the body. And that's why we have to give account for the deeds done in our body. But he says, bringing down the lofty and proud. And that's why, if you look at it, it says he's bringing down the lofty and the proud, or whatever. Doesn't it just burn you to people in life and the people in the world the tears in the world the way they treat the children of God I'm like Paul with that in Jesus. You know that I'm jealous of the people of God with a godly jealousy I hate to see someone doing children of God these things I especially those children that I have accountability for or whatever. I hate to see the things of this life, and when they're brought low, it gives me some sort of satisfaction or strength to help, to be able to help God. That's what I want to do, pleasing God, and that's why we present our bodies as a living sacrifice in His service. And if it's service that we should thread up on the wicked, that we should win these battles, and we stop seeing that. That's why other people in the world and things, they have heroes, and they have movie stars, and they have certain people in their lives, and young men and things, children watching, you know, all these shows and things where the hero pull off some fantastic feat or whatever. But I kind of not look at that in a physical way anymore. I want to look more at those things in a spiritual light. That each day I walk, each thing I do in life, as me, myself, personally, I want to be victorious in Christ each day. I want to be overcomer. So I'm not overwhelmed. The world will see me on Facebook or YouTube. The feet in the world are going viral for doing all these things. I just want to please God and walk pleasing unto Him in overcoming each day the obstacles and the things that He gives me to tread down, to walk on. In other words, I want to walk the path that He's leading, guiding me on. I want to do that. As I was telling you about Jacob's brothers and things that threw him in the pit and What do we produce in our lives if we do things like that? If we're children of God or whatever? Does it work on our conscience or has the world caused our conscience to be seared as with a hot iron? You know, some people don't think about the things that they do. It doesn't bother them. They don't go back and pray about it. They don't feel cognizant of it. In other words, They have no sensitivity to the suffering of mankind. It's some movie TVs and commercials and things I don't like to see or whatever because I'm not able to do anything about it. To the lame children and the children with the cleft tongues and the help that need help in Africa and all these places or whatever. Those commercials are touching and is to deal with the sensitivity of it. But I hate to see these situations that I can't do anything about. And that's why I'm driven to prayer. That's why I'm mourning, and that's why I'm thinking. That's why I'm not a whole lot of laughter thing, because there's gonna be a reversal. All of us that are walking around cheerful and happy and not worrying about anything now, there's come a time when we mourn because we should be mourning and sighing for what's going on in the nation, for what's going on in the world today. This nation is in awful shape and I mourn for this nation. There's no justice in the nation. Justice have gone. There's no justice in this nation. There's no unity in this nation. It's a land of hypocrites and that's dealing with those ghostly fears. Their consciousness, the only time Joseph's brother's consciousness or thing bothered them was when Joseph was reintroduced in the scene. And when they told Joseph that Father said not to harm us for what we've done to you or whatever, had they forgot that? Or did they live with that every day that they had told their father that their brother was dead, and they had left him in a pit, and they had sold him off to the Midianites or whatever? See, because if that's not bothering you through the years of what you've done somebody or whatever, that's a horrible state to be in, and that's what Christ does. He removes our guilt. He removes our guilt because we consistently repentance, and I was telling you yesterday about deja vu or whatever. As God brings me, the goodness of God brings me to repentance to see how wicked and evil and a worm I was. The things in my life that God brings back up that road. Remember I told you, you're on a road or on a path. to where you could see how you once was, the decision which you once made. Now the Spirit's gonna lead you and guide you in all truth and you see how repugnant or how evil that was. You repent of it and you turn and go on this path. He's lead you in the way of righteousness. You would never do that anymore. you wouldn't even think about doing it anymore and it hurts you that as Paul says, he says, once I used to persecute and kill Christians. I persecuted those of the way. People were called those of the way there. But he thought about that so you have to have some kind of conscious that God's quickening and making you alive and you becoming sensitive to God or the world is desynthesizing you. The world is desynthesizing you, and that's one thing, and that's what I say sometimes. I reprove... and people that I love, but they also say, reprove a fool and you'll get a blight, you know. Sometime when you criticize people without good sense, they say, well, I never thought of that. And I'm sorry I looked at it that way. But you know, most people that you reprove or tell something, oh, and they go excuse it away or make an excuse why they did it. They're going to know. They're going to have some reason. And after a while, you stop explaining stuff to that person or saying stuff to that person. They don't have as good excuse or reason why they did what they did. And no criticism lands there. But a lot of times I tell people, OK, well, I'm glad you explained it. I understand. Now, I see now whatever. I didn't know. But that's when you learn something. And that's what older people start doing, that they don't know it all. And that's when you, from a wise counsel, and I tell you that the church that used to meet every day, the church the people used to meet, what thing was going on. They heard other people's side. They heard their side. And then they decided the spirit would two or three are gathered together in the name of God and agree God is the God in the midst. Well, he'll give you proper direction and everything. You can get the proper counsel. You can get the proper path. There's wisdom in a multitude of counselors. But when you get together with Job and Elihu, Ziphad and all his friends. It was the three friends and it was this young person. Job didn't learn anything from them because they had the excuse for everything and Job was wrong and couldn't nobody tell him nothing. Elihu, the younger man, he rebuked him at one time, but it was God just told Job to pray for him or whatever because some friends of people, the religious ones, you're not going to be able to correct. they would die in that shape that's why it says the children of the kingdom shall be cast out because a lot of religious people and that's why i tell you it's hard getting in a religious argument or whatever because sometime all this could do is you will be striving with that person if that person is not open to learn or that person is not hungry and thirsty for righteousness. They're just trying to show you how much they know. They're in a debate with you to win you over. The Apostle Paul writes in Romans 7 in the 14th verse that God's law is spiritual, but the average person, however, considers laws as strictly physical guidelines that were invented to restrict them. But in the widest sense of the word, man's relationship to God affected by sin is what constitutes guilt. sin separates us from God and guilt is the result of that separation. Remember I told you it's your iniquity that separates you from God. But if you're not aware, if you think that this is just something physical, and I tell you we wasn't able to keep the law the reason God removed the law that Christ came instead. Now he's going to write those laws on our hearts because The law is spiritual and it was written for a spiritual man, but by being human, flesh and blood, it was contrary. It was weak through our flesh. It's weak through our flesh. So that's why our conscience, a lot of us, you trying to pour water into concrete, it's just not going to penetrate. It's not going to sink in. It can't assimilate it to itself. The urge to satisfy our desires despite warnings against us, just as it did for Adam and Eve, despite them being warned or whatever that carnal flesh could justify, what they've done or their pride or whatever. Some people can't be told anything, you know. They have to know it all. They had a way out of whatever. And that's why it says the proud you should trotting underfoot because the proud refuse to learn. The proud reject knowledge because they're self-centered and it's all about them. It never was about dying to self. Self is the reason you got yourself in that condition and the way you are or the way you are then or whatever. And that's why we say there's a way that seemeth right to a man and the end of it is death and destruction. So in that way of that direction as we go, That's why we're destroyed. And we're supposed to be on a highway. You remember I told you that highway we own, a highway to heaven, a path of direction? And a fool shall not err in. It was Isaiah 35, 8 through 9. A highway will be there and a roadway, and it will be called the holy way. The unclean will not travel it, but it will be for those who walk on the way, those that are redeemed. because these are the people that are changed. These are the people that are born again and be regenerated. So they're taking heed to the word of God. They're coming to the house of God. They're here in Christ, and they're continuing in his word. But as the pastors and teachers admonish other people, that's a fool. That's away from God. That's in the church, but that person is not converted. So that person is one that's physically minded. His conscience of guilt doesn't convict him that he's wrong or whatever. The spirit's not convincing him of sin. So in that person's eyes, a man's ways is right in his own eyesight. He doesn't see anything wrong with what he did, even though that's leading to destruction. And God tells us, your thoughts and your ways are not like my thoughts and my ways. Then he brings in a prophet like Ezekiel and preaching to people. They say, well, Ezekiel, they love to come to church and hear what you're saying or whatever, but they not gonna do it. He was telling Isaiah, you gonna be preaching to them. They gonna hear, but they not gonna hear. They gonna say they see, but they not gonna see. They not gonna be able to understand. So they're not on the highway to heaven. They're on the broad way to destruction, sitting in the church, going to hell, because them of themselves are right within themselves. They don't take criticism. They don't die to self. They're not on the path or in the way. This way they can't be on, because they're not born again. They need to be born again. They don't know Christ. They're doing the feeding of the multitudes. They're clothing people. They're giving drink to those that need drink. They're casting out devils. But Jesus never knew them because they're kind of like Burger King. They have it their way. It's always their way. They're right. A great deal more exists within Proverbs of how deep the pride is ingrained in our character. That's why I said it's two seas in the earth. And that case started all the way back with King. He said, you are your father the devil. You are murder. But there are slanders and different types of sin that originate from pride, that comes as birth of pride, that pride brings about. Forges us to forge ahead in our way, never saying we wrong, but some kind of way or another. I'm going to explain my way out of this. Even though I was wrong, I'm going to make them see that I was right. If you'd heard those guys, you'd seen them. Even though they're wrong, they could think that in talks, smooth talkers, they say deceiving and deceiving themselves with great swelling words or whatever. Just because people say, OK, I see, I understand, that don't mean that they agree with you. They may understand and see that you don't understand and know. Just because somebody say, OK, I see, I understand. In other words, they're ending the argument or whatever, because they realize that's just it. It's going to be an argument, and you can't understand. You never will understand. So there are those, and that's why I say that's when you become great and spiritual, and that's when you can throw it on the devil or whatever. It's a scripture in Psalms that says that these will be in great jeopardy, because just because this person didn't say anything, you thought that they were just like you. Every closed mouth, every closed eye ain't sleep every time. Just because somebody ain't telling you something, the book of Amos says, the prudent will see it and keep silent. There's gonna be a famine of hearing the word. So there's gonna be some people that's so spiritual that always do anything. And it's like that with something, do you have children sometime that you stop telling something? And you said, all right, go ahead on. Because you know that they will come excuse for what they did or there's a reason and that I don't want to stand as a parent why they did what they would you say go it up and you hate to come back and say I told you so whatever but you know what the Consequences of them ignoring us and you you're not gonna run yourself gray or crazy keep telling them over and over He didn't come down there say Adam didn't I tell you not to eat of that tree? I'm not gonna tell you this time, but next time you eat of it. I'm gonna do it No He told you, you had been warned. And that's wrong with the church, a lot of it just because God doesn't do things like He did in the time of Ananias and Sapphira. That one example showed that when they didn't pay the right tithe to Peter and they went ill, they dropped dead. But ever since then, people been not doing right by God monetarily, right? Only one time in scripture we see where God kills somebody for working on the Sabbath. You remember the man that Moses and them held? They stoned him with the stick. They stoned him for picking up sticks on the Sabbath day. But God didn't do it, but that one time, right? All those were examples, the Old Testament was written as examples of admonition for us. Those are laws that the people couldn't put. Even though the law is on the book, you see that God is dead serious about this. Just because he's not doing it in the book of Ecclesiastes, just because judgment or punishment against an evil work is not carried away, the hearts of men wax worse and worse. In other words, if you let somebody off with something, or you give them an inch, they're going to take a mile. They're not going to stop doing that. And that's why I say some people, you do something for them, you owe them $5 today and they don't pay you back. And then later on, it went so long that they still owe you and they ask to borrow $10 or $15 from you since you didn't keep begging them for that back or whatever. And it will get worse and worse. But just because that punishment is not carried out, that doesn't mean consequences not coming. They're storing up wrath against the day of wrath. God will pay with retaliation and vengeance for all we do against him and that what we're not doing. There will be a reversal one day. There will be a payment for sin that comes about one day. Pride is ingrained in our character And we may not fall into immediate death, but we do fail to achieve the success we have hoped for through common impatience. Avoiding hard work or even sheer hard-hitting is because we refuse to follow sound counsel. That's like what we was talking about earlier. A lot of people try to win the lottery or try to get other people to do their stuff for them, and I always teach my children about doing hard work. That's why he told Adam, by the sweat of your brow, you shall do this and you shall toil. And God had put us that way so when we receive rest in Christ Jesus, we'll know that Christ had given us grace to receive. He had relieved our burden. He had relieved all our cares and everything. So now we follow and we devoted only to him. Everything else we ask for directions from him how to treat or how to devise the matter how to carry the matter out That's why every day we pray to God to direct us and lead us and guide us in the path to lead us and guide us in the way because We can't understand or we don't know And we know our ways lead to death, and that's where it was leading us until we were born again or whatever. So we pray, lead us not into no temptation. Lead me this way, and lead and guide me. We're always looking for the path of the right way, the straight path. We ask him to lead us down the right path, that path that leads to Jesus Christ, that leads to eternal life with Jesus Christ and eternal life. covenant relationship with him. I'm going to say that right after a while. Wait a minute here. Hosea of the 14th chapter says, oh now I skipped one, Jeremiah. Jeremiah the 16th, the 6th chapter and the 16th verse about the path of the way of the direction. It says, yet the Lord pleads with you still. Ask where the good road is. The godly path you used to walk in in the days long ago. Now he's talking to Judah there, but in New Testament, what we pray to God, God tells us to pray to the Father. We pray to Jesus Christ that he would lead and guide us by his spirit every day. We pray for our daily bread and that God will lead us in our walk and that thy kingdom come and that will be done in our lives. And that's what we ask of him for his guidance in the right way. Because the old ways and the old paths, he's just referring back to something here. Ancient Jeremiah is talking scripturally. And that's why I say we have to look at the law as the basis of what we're doing, that Old Testament law. But we have to see that it's in Jesus Christ. That's who we ask. And now, that's who our trust, our faith and confidence is in. We have to be hid in Christ. We're hid in Him. We no longer live our resurrected life as hid in Christ. That's where we want to travel. We will find rest for our souls in Christ. He says, He that is heavy laden or burdened, come unto me and you'll find rest. He said, but a lot of us replied, no, that is not the road we want to. They will not walk in that way. A lot of them refused it. A lot of them told Jesus Christ, that's a hard saying you say. And say, who shall do it? And they never walked that way again. Because you remember he said, you must eat of my flesh and drink of my blood? And that was a hard saying. Some of the things Christ said, if we really look at it, it does seem hard, but it's dying to self. It's crucifying self. And this is the way we have to go. We have to take up our cross and deny ourself. That's on the road. Taking up your cross and following after him in denying self-denial is the hardest way to go. Hosea 14, verse 9 says, Who is wise, or whoever is spiritually wise, let him understand these things. Whoever is spiritually discerning and understanding, let him know these things. For the ways of the Lord are right, and the righteous will walk in them. the righteous will walk in them. So when Isaiah 26 says, open up the gates that the righteous shall come in, we're talking about entering the promised land, entering into his millennial kingdom, entering into his rest, the righteous, Satan, no one can hold us back. The world is waiting for the manifest, all of creation is waiting for the manifestations of the sons of God. He says, But transgressors will stumble and fall. People that are in bondage or transgress the laws of God, they're not able to walk this highway. They're not able to even err up on it. You must needs be born again to enter. The only way you're going to get in is being born again. And if you're birthed again, that means to be a son of God, you're led by the spirit of God. to be carnally minded is death. So are you being led today by God's Spirit or are you being led by what you feel? The way it seems right to you, are you being led by His Word and by His Spirit? That's why we have to study and know what's in the Word of God, but the Spirit has to reveal and interpret it to us. So we have to have both those, the Spirit and the Word. We can't do it without it, of righteousness. And we went over that a few times. Matthew 7 and 1, it says, do not judge and criticize and condemn others unfairly. Notice that at Denim A today, unfairly, with an attitude of self-righteous superiority, As though you were assuming the office of judge. No, the reason I'm doing this, this is what the Word of God says. That's why I'm judging you. No, you couldn't be married to another guy because the Word of God said that's wrong. The reason I'm saying that a man should work, shouldn't eat, the Word of God tells us that. I can't promote laziness. I can't go around and do your work for you. so that you will not be judged unfairly and God does not judge us unfairly and not hypocritically. Remember I told you there are some in Christianity if their preachers are taking the sharp edge off of the gospel. if they're taking the sharp edge off the teaching, and that's what most churches and most preachers are doing now. That's what the menace of Satan has been transforming into angels of light. It's a meek, mild, little sisified Jesus that they're preaching, and everybody in the church is yucky, you know, because of all that false piety and all this trying to show yourself this way. That's not who you are or whatever. You have a facade or whatever. You're going the broad way. Have you noticed some people, and the old people used to call that putting on airs. This ain't who you is. But that broad way, it says, enter ye in at the straight gate, for wide is the gate and broad is the way. that lead to destruction, and many there be that go in their head." Now, he's not talking about the world! He's not talking about... he's talking about people going in... that's in the church! He's talking about that church like in Revelation. He said that he's... unless they repent, he's to rise up and fight against. Those are the ones that's going the broad way because the world is not going the way of Christ at all! But you remember I said, the fools can't enter on the way. You got a lot of people in church. Man, forget that preacher. I do this my way. I can come to God the way I want. I take my time and do this the way I want to do it in my own time, okay? But that preacher is sent there to convict you of sin. And once you get to where you're ignoring the word of God, ignoring the preachers and teachers of God and the spirits of God or your godly family, if you can't do it down here, you can't do it up there. You won't even enter in up there. He said, and many there be that go in that broad way, because straight is the gate, and narrow is the way, which leadeth unto life, and few there be that go in that way. So they are right when the world be saying, and everybody in the church gonna be saying, they are right about that. You do have a lot of wolves in sheep's clothing. You do have a lot of false pretenders or false professors in the church. And like I said, this nation have brought about a apostate church that shows a television, Christ, a television, Jesus, all of these shows and things slinging around an easy believism. I don't want to call no church's name or whatever in these things. If you're trapped in those places, you're just trapped in there. We're preaching and teaching the Word of God. The Word's gonna draw you, and you'll hear the Word. Either you'll receive it or reject it. You've heard it somewhere. Christ, as the man of diabetes said when he died and went to heaven, and he was asked, he said, send Lazarus to cool my tongue, or whatever he says. They got Moses and the prophets. Let them hear them. And he said, but if one rose from the dead, he was talking to Christ. He said, but if one rose from dead, they would listen to him. He said, nah, if they don't believe Moses and the prophets, they're not going to believe one, though he rose from the dead. And there are people right now, they don't actually believe Jesus. Now, it's convenient for them to believe in a Jesus. It's convenient for them to believe in Christianity. But they don't know Jesus, not the real Jesus. And Jesus will tell them, I never knew you. Like I say, it's a sharp edge on the gospel now. It's gonna be a Christ that a lot of people don't like. Jesus is the way. He says, John 14 and six, I am the way, the truth and the life and no man coming unto me but by the Father. Because through Godly sorrow, Godly repentance, God has a way to bring you to Christ. God has many a tribulation or many a thing that you could have to go through to get to Christ. It's not this easy believism that people tell you and just walk the aisle and all this lovey-dovey stuff and all this that they don't preach against sin and all these things. We will have a problem with that Christ. With that teaching, that's the broad road. Okay, here's one from the Amplified Versions, Hebrews 9 and 8. It says, By this the Holy Spirit signifies that the way into the holy place, that is, the true holy of holies and the presence of God, has not yet been disclosed as long as the first or outer tabernacle is still standing. That is, as long as the Levitical system of worship remains a recognized institution. In other words, you remember I told you he moved the law, he taken away the first volume of the book to establish the second. So that Levitical law is standing there to the physical world. to the people that are not walking in the way. That same Moses is going to condemn them. Like it says, not one jot nor one till of the law be taken out of the way till all be fulfilled. But then, to those of us that are born again, that hear the word of Christ, that in Jeremiah, the 34th chapter, where he makes a new covenant, this is a spiritual covenant that he makes, a circumcision of the heart. heart. He takes out that old stony heart where you're birthed again. This is to make you a spiritual man. In other words, this places you in righteousness with God. He's taking away that old system. This is by faith in Jesus Christ. It came by preaching, the preaching of the Word of God. Hearing comes about. That's how we're saved. You can't be saved but by preaching. And so we came preaching and teaching the gospel of Jesus Christ. The good news is that God has reconciled man back unto himself, gave us a new standing. We're a new creation in Christ Jesus. There's a new system of belief where we have faith in Christ. That's our way. That's the vehicle out of here. It's like the ark being prepared. Unless you are in Christ, Unless you're a head in this chamber, in this ark of Christ. Unless you are in Christ, everything else outside of there is going to perish. Heaven and earth is passing away. This world is passing away. There's going to be what? A new heaven and a new earth. It only goes with a spiritual birth because all of us that have all this corruptibility, this mortality, we will pull off this old corruptible body, this old corruptible flesh because flesh and blood cannot enter the kingdom of heaven. We will have a new name. We will be in Christ, but we will have a new body, a spiritual body that's not subject to decay or whatever, but that is used to being obedient to God, that is subject unto God, not their own way. Everybody, there's going to be unity of the spirit, unity of the faith. All of us will be one in Christ Jesus. That same mind that's in Christ Jesus is going to be in us because it was formed here on earth by the transforming and renewing of our mind. A new thought system, a new process. We are brand new. He has presented us as chaste virgins under Christ. So that old system is gone through the doctrines taught by Jesus Christ. That's what we have to be on, the apostle doctrine. That's what Jesus Christ taught. That's what the apostles taught. That's why it says those that believe on me through their word. Whose word? The apostles' word. Acts 2, 9. Acts 9 and 2. Yet saw breathing out threatening and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord. went unto the high priest, and desired of him letters to Damascus, to the synagogues, that if he found any of this way, whether they were men or women, he might bring them bound unto Jerusalem." So what they were? They were on the path. They were in a way. They were going a way. Now, at Antioch, this is where they started to call them Christians. they developed that word Christianity of Christ, and that's why nowadays some say Antichrist, because the Christians are not truly, like I say, the majority of Christians in America, Evangelical Christians and all these Protestants, a lot of them, are really Antichrist. They believe in another Jesus. But the people of the way, in other words, they had a certain direction or pattern that they were going in a form of life that they had. Acts the 19th chapter says that, at the same time, there arose no small disturbance about the way. That's how it reads in King James Version. And the way what they were saying is that these people are following the life that Christ followed. This is a pattern or direction. They're on this path or whatever. They didn't refer to it as Christianity. on the path, or on the way. Acts 22 and 4, Paul says, and I persecuted this way unto death, binding and delivering into prison both men and women. Anybody he found living that lifestyle, on that path, or living in that particular way, following Jesus Christ, he imprisoned. because they were following the way. The way was a path of the doctrine of Jesus Christ. They were following his instructions. They was living the life the way he lived it. They was imitating him. We see Paul before Herod, a gripper, and he says, but I confess this to you, that according to the way, which they call the vices of heretical way, I do worship and serve the God of our fathers. In other words, Paul first persecuted because he said these people worshipped somebody named Jesus or whatever and they disregarded the law of Moses and they casted Moses aside. God hadn't given him understanding yet or whatever. But by Herod being a Gentile king or whatever, but he knew what was going on, he was an Idomenian, so he knew what was going on among the Jews. and the jews despised jesus christ and that jews despised paul or whatever because paul had stopped being a pharisee and he started following the way and he told herod, he told the king of greece i know you've heard of the way that was a certain second they was turning the world upside down that's why i say most christians aren't in agreement with the people of the way of people that's on the path now because it's contradictory, it's hypocritical. The majority of the churches are out of the way. They're on the broad way that's leading to destruction. They're no longer following Christ even though they have the name of Antichrist, of Christianity. Anti also could mean in place of, they've taken the place of Christ. they're in that that's why paul says they're preaching another jesus counterfeited jude jesus is they mimic in his doctrine there was in sheep's clothing uh... i had one more one or two more here that i want to try to get in before i end this reversal of men's position by God. God's going to reverse the position of men in the latter days. And that's what we're seeing a part of. As those of us that are walking in the way, we can see as we're threading people down, or threading down the wicked or evil of the world, He's lifting His people up, but He's bringing the others down, the wicked down. Because the wicked are like chaff, a lot of them will be blown away, but a lot of them will be lowered to lower positions. We went over someone a few months ago and I told you that God Reverse the position. I don't want to delay the time trying to think about who it was. It just crossed my mind It was Shepner I think the treasurer or whatever and that he didn't believe and God brought him down and someone else I didn't forgot his name that took his place but Isaiah 47 and I mean Psalms 147 and 6 is But God is the judge. He put it down one and set it up another. So you remember he told his disciples that it wasn't his place to... He says, can I sit at your left hand and my other son can he sit at your right hand? God is in charge of the world and Christ was sent by God. He was the sent one. He was an apostle. He's the apostle of our faith. He was sent. The Father had sent Him. And that's why you notice that He never took glory or never brought reputation to Himself. He made Himself of no reputation. But he gave God the glory or whatever. And when they asked him, they said on the right hand and left, he referred them back and she said, you told the guy, I can't do that. I don't have the authority to do it. He told the mother, he says. Yeah, well, they shall drink of the cup that I shall drink of, but to sit at my right hand or my left hand is not mine to give. In other words, this was of the Father, because remember, each one of us could receive the reward we have for the deeds done in our body. Only God knows what this sister here been through. Only God knows what you've been through, the motivations, the thoughts, and the intent. So that's who you looking to for reward. It's not the people that you're trying to please. It's not your spouse or your children or whatever. Because if you have a new name and a new body and everything else and there's no marriage and giving and marriage in the next life, what you have is brother and sister and we're all brother and sister, but you have a multitude of reward according to the deeds you've done in your body. So God's going to reward each one of us. A lot of us are not aware of how much the other person has done or whatever. So we're not looking to man for our reward. Remember, I told you the story of the prodigal son where the younger son didn't have anything left. He was going to be one that didn't have many mansions to live in. He didn't have, he had gambled away, he had lost everything he had. He didn't send nothing up to heaven to lay up treasures in heaven. All that the elder son, he was in charge, so he was going to be taking care of the younger son. It doesn't go the way it does down here, where people promote people and nepotism and all this. You could put your children in a certain position, or people you know, or flattery gets you in some positions, or bribes and everything. But it's a true, honest, just system that God has. That's why I say the law is spiritual and the world can't follow the law and don't follow the law even though they may lie and say they do. Especially this nation. But only God is just and that's just as is Jesus Christ. He's just and right. with these leaderships and covenant in the book of Proverbs 12 and 15 it follows the same pattern of teaching that I've been quoting to you in Proverbs 14 and 12 but the way of a fool is right in his own eyes but he who he's counseled is wise. In the revised English translate this more strongly in alignment with Proverbs 14 and 12 He says, a fool's conduct is right in his own eyes. To listen to advice shows wisdom. Remember I said 14.12 says a man wages right in his own eyes? proverbs twelve fifteen comes and stated this way it says a man's conduct in the revised english a man's conduct is right in his own eyes in other words is right according to what he did and what he's doing you just don't understand what i'm doing or whatever way of what i'm saying and that's what i say we can't have our own standards and our own conduct Because that leads to destruction it leads to wrong ways of life The Word of God has to be the standard The way of God and that's what I was telling and saying earlier. It's the principle let me understand everything going on because a Precept or principle is built by something and it's there so we could have many different situations or whatever but the principle of the precept is there and Can you understand what I'm saying? So regardless of what you think is right and what I think is right, let each and every one of us be alive by what the Word of God says. So this is what the Word of God says on a matter like that or whatever. Because sometimes the way we think, we end up rejecting God's counsel because our ways are right and we're thinking by our own heart and our own mind and not the word of God or not the counsel of God's word. You remember I said Absalom rejected Hushai's counsel, and he went to Ahithophel's counsel, because Ahithophel was wiser, but God had said that Ahithophel would give him the wrong counsel. See, a lot of times you can reject counsel and not listen at the right counsel, and it seems right. So that's why we have to deny self and be fully dependent on the Lord. So no one trusts himself. I don't trust myself. Do you trust yourself? Man is a fool that trusted his own self when he was preaching on trust. Man that trusted in man is a fool. Promotion, it says in the Living Reads, for promotion and power comes from nowhere on earth. but only from God. He promotes one, he deposes another. That's why I was telling the people, OK, if Donald Trump is president, God placed Donald Trump in there. He allowed him to be in there. Can't nobody reject it. That's why the insurrection against the capitol and all Trump did to stay in power, if that's the system that you're going by and God allowed this to happen, no matter what Trump thinks and how many people follow him think, your own system condemns you as wrong, let alone God condemning you as wrong, because he say obey those that have rule and authority over you, and that you're thinking about changing laws or whatever. So if he said it where Joe Biden won over you, you just want to give it to Joe Biden? Because all the fighting and thing you do, Joe Biden's gonna still be president. It's a promotion comes from the Lord. God could have fixed it where he would have won the election. But it wasn't God. It wouldn't happen. So all those preachers hollering, the devil cheated. The devil did this, and the devil did that. I didn't read nowhere in the book of Job where Job blamed the devil for anything. He said, God had did this. See, you don't believe in the sovereignty of God if you evangelical Christian and you think the devil and cheated him out of election and that the devil put Joe Biden on the throne. Well, hold on. Who in charge on earth? Is God sovereign or Satan sovereign? Jesus said, I have all power. All power and authority. So whoever's president, he allowed that to happen. Watch your preacher. That's what I say. But there are many preachers that are leading these bands of people to Broadway. 147 in King James read, the Lord lifted up the meek. He casted the wicked down to the ground. Now a lot of people rejoicing, and that's the same scripture I just now read in the living. But those that understand what meek means know that Biden been running for that position for the last 30 years. He ran for president three different times. But doesn't he have a meek spirit? He don't have a meek and humble spirit to you? And to those that said, well, Trump had wicked ways, hadn't God cast him down? Wasn't it God that cast him down? So we have to realize, well, a lot of people are rejoicing, and they're seeing there is justice in the world. They would have figured it wasn't any justice if Trump would have won. Just as Trump's people figured there ain't no justice because Trump lost. But who's on what path? Only God knows who's on what path, and I think I know what path I'm on. Mark says, the book of Mark, the 10th chapter, Mark says, but many people who seem to be important now will be the least important then, and many who are considered least here shall be greatest there. And King James, it says, But many who are first will be last, and the last first. So how God ranks people is not how man ranks people. The positions and things we have now, that's not the final position. That's not the final authorities we have. That's not the way God will be in the kingdom, those that understand God that are in the way. So you're honoring your parents and you're doing certain things the way God say do. But you know in the next life, there will be no father, mother, brother, sister, and all these other things. Because we will all be brother and there's no marriage in here. There's no grandkids in here. We're all the same. There's no male or female. So we have to look to God in all these things. I have two more things to read. I don't have any time left. Luke 625 says, but woe judgment is coming to you who are rich, and place your faith in possessions while remaining spiritually impoverished. For you are already receiving your comfort in full, and there is nothing left to be awarded to you. Woe to you who are well fed, now for you will be hungry. Woe to you who laugh now, enjoying the life of self-indulgence, for you will mourn and weep later. Woe to you when all people speak well of you and praise you, for their fathers used to treat the false prophets in the same way." See, there's a lot of people living now. They're living now as they for now. Let us eat, drink, and be merry and die. They're not thinking that God is forming a character in them. They're not thinking that, you remember I said a lot of us are not mourning for what's going on in the nation, are not weeping because they're doing all right. The economy's doing all right with them, but they're in the position they wanna be in. But they're not weeping and mourning for just how bad the nation is about the people that was freezing or without electricity and water in Texas last week, a couple of weeks ago. They're not thinking about the people devastated by hurricanes and storms and other third world countries. They're not thinking about all the countries and nations that don't even have vaccine there yet. They're not thinking about the people in Sudan and all these other people that are living in poverty and the way things are in life. So once you start becoming or come out of the world, you will see there's a lot of work and prayer and grieving and mourning for mankind and striving and asking God that let me be a laborer in your vineyard. He says the harvest is truly wonderful but there's not enough laborers, there's not enough gatherers in your vineyard. The harvest is ripe. There are a lot of people out there wanting the truth, but there are not a lot of people out there walking and giving in the truth and being examples of truth. We have to be examples of being the truth, the way and the life, and that's the only way that