You are listening to the Patriot Pastors Podcast, where we talk about today's issues from a pastor's perspective, as well as calling America back to the faith of our fathers. Without God, democracy will not and cannot long endure. If we ever forget that we're one nation under God, then we will be a nation gone under. Here's your host, Wade Lentz and Harold Smith. Welcome to the Patriot pastor podcast. I am your co-host Harold Smith joined as always by my good friend, Wade Lentz. Wade, how are you doing? Doing pretty good. In spite of the sickness that I've had again, man, I, uh, I'm a little injured myself. My thumb is sore from lipping all the crappie that I caught yesterday. Wow. Wow. About a 25 crappie and about that many bass. And yeah, it was a good little afternoon of fishing yesterday. And so if my shoulder kind of looks droopy in the video, I've hauled a lot of fish out. Oh my goodness. You've been doing a lot better than I have for sure. That's the only time I've been fishing in a long time, but I just took everything that needed to be done on a Thursday and said, I'll do it on Friday. I'm going to go. And really sometimes Wade, that's the only way you're going to make it happen is just to say I'm going, you know, win, lose or draw I'm going. That's the truth. That's what I did. We haven't done a podcast in a while and you've been extremely busy. I've been extremely busy. I didn't do any podcast the month of January just because I had so many irons in the fire. It's hard for two busy pastors to get together, line up their schedules, and do this. But one of the motivating factors that that got us together today was you had mentioned America being under the wrath of God. More explicitly, you said America under Romans chapter one. When you said that, I knew exactly the passage You would. And I said, yeah, that's if I had to pick a place in the Bible, I mean, Jack and Rex, Eleven would probably go somewhere in the book of Revelations to say where it is. And a lot of professing Christians would try to put us in some chapter of Revelation. But I would really put a squarely in Romans chapter one. When I look at the moral condition, the just the general overall consensus of most Americans today would line squarely up with Romans chapter one. What do you say, Wade? Yeah, absolutely. Yes. Someone said to me the other day, said, hey, we are in a Romans chapter one nation. And he said this amongst some individuals that did not really understand what he was talking about. And so I had to explain what he meant and which got me thinking as I was as I was explaining this to them using the Bible, just how eye opening it was to the relevancy of what we're going through right now in America. And here's what I want to do. I'm just going to go just verse by verse by verse and, um, through 25 and you'll take over after that, but let's look at it together and just see how, how closely related this is. Um, it says in Romans chapter one, verse 18, this is what Paul says for the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness. and unrighteousness of men who suppress the truth in righteousness. And so when Paul mentions God's wrath being revealed against all ungodliness, he's speaking of a current reality. Right. And here's the thing, Harold, many times, you know, we think of God's wrath as a future event only, but God's wrath is not merely a future event that's reserved for judgment day. No, what Paul is saying here, this is an ongoing response. to humanity's rebellion against God's righteous standards. So in other words, God's wrath is actively manifesting itself in the world today as a consequence of human sin and disobedience of God's righteous standards. Are we seeing this or not? Oh, absolutely. I mean, It is, it is amazing when you start just going verse by verse through the latter part of chapter one, it's almost like you've read the, the latest headlines on your Google feed and you can turn and look at your Bible and go, yep, that's, it's the same thing. Yeah, right. Another thing that I gather from verse 18 is that we learn that God's wrath is not arbitrary. It's not random. It is a righteous response to ungodliness and unrighteousness. Why is that? Because God's character demands justice. Yeah. And his wrath then is an expression of his perfect justice in response to human rebellion. You see it over and over in the Old Testament, Wade. You see nations that just rebel and rebel and rebel against God, and God says, OK, their unrighteousness has come up to my level. I've taken notice of it. It's not that God didn't see what was going on. It's just it reached a level that God said, I'm going to respond. He did that to Babylonians. He did that to the Amorites. He did that to the Amalekites. He did that to Moab. I mean, the Moabites. God does it over and over and over. A nation, Sodom and Gomorrah, they reach a certain level of wickedness and God, for the sanctity of the rest of the world, takes them out of the picture. That's right. That's right. So he goes on in verse 19. He says, because what may be known of God is manifest in them for God has shown it to them. Now, Paul here, he's saying that humanity stands without excuse for the rebellion against God, because God has unmistakably revealed himself to them. How has God revealed himself to to mankind? Well, he's revealed himself in two different ways through the revelation of creation, and he has revealed himself through the inner conscience of man so that any man who lives in this world can look into the heavens. He can see this universe and know the complexity of all the living organisms, know that there has to be a creator, know that there has to be a divine creator. I mean, just look at the, um, the orderliness of natural law, you know, you and I are getting ready to, uh, experience a solar eclipse here in what six weeks. I think so. Yeah. This is something that they have predicted, uh, many years ago, decades ago. And they can even tell us when the next one will occur. 2044. Over Arkansas again, 2044. Why is that? Because of the orderliness of natural law. God is a orderly God that the way the earth moves and the moon moves around the earth, they can all calculate that. So it tells us that There is a God, there is a divine creator. But then also within our conscience, we know that there is a moral law. Even a lost person who has never heard the gospel knows the difference between right and wrong. He knows it's wrong to take somebody else's things. He knows it's wrong to take somebody else's life. And so because of that, verse 20, says, for since the creation of the world, his invisible attributes are clearly seen being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead, so that they are without excuse. So they can't say, well, we had no idea that you existed. We didn't know that there was a God. No, you knew through creation and your very conscience that there is a God. Verse 21 says, because all they, although they knew God, now he's not, he's not speaking about the Christian here. He's speaking about those who have been revealed through creation and their conscience that there is a God. They did not glorify him as God, nor were thankful. but became futile in their thoughts, and their foolish hearts were darkened. So despite humanity's innate knowledge of God, what do they do? They fail to honor Him. They fail to give Him thanks. They fail to glorify and praise Him. And that leads us down through this degradation. Verse 22, it says, professing to be wise, they became fools. And they changed the glory of the incorruptible God into an image made like corruptible man and the birds and four-footed animals and creeping things, professing to be wise. They became fools. Let me give you an illustration for that way. There was a commercial some years ago about a parent trying to make their kids take medicine. And they were like, time to take your cough medicine. And they turn around and the kids gone. And he thinks he's pretty smart. He goes and gets behind the drapes of the window, you know, and he's like, I'm going to hide back here, but his feet are showing out the bottom of the drapes. You know, mom's looking like, where did you go? And I was like, you know, he thinks he's hidden. And so it is with mankind when they think they're wise, they think they figured it out, but before God, there's no hiding that it's foolishness to, to devise a plan and not consider the creator and sustainer of all things. It's as foolish as trying to hide behind the drapes when your feet are showing, you know, it doesn't, you think you've really done something, but you have it. Yes. Yeah. And in mankind's self-proclaimed wisdom, humanity descends into folly. This is why we have people today that have more degrees than a thermometer. from Ivy league schools that cannot define what a woman is. That's right. Okay. Professing to be wise, they became fools. Yeah. Uh, so that this intellectual pride, what happens, it blinds them to the truth and it leads them further away from God. This is where we are at. We are being, our nation is being run by educated fools. Yeah. whose mind has been given over to sin. The basic laws of science are defied by modern science, the law of physics, you know, and an object in action stays at action unless another force pulls upon it for every action. There's an equal but opposite reaction. Basic things you learned in ninth grade science class defy evolution. Defy the creation of a solar system. You know, something has to cause this. Things don't just come about from nothing. Explosions do not bring order. They bring chaos. These are all basic laws, but the smartest people of our day believe the biggest lie and the biggest, uh, just defies their own logic. The elementary principles of what they've learned to create something for the sole purpose of. removing a God who created it. That's the whole motivation. We can't say God assigns gender like you were talking about. We have to say that's our job. We are in control. That verse you read, verse 23, Taken the glory of the uncorruptible God and making it like a bird or a man or four, you look at every culture. They have worshiped the corn, the sun, Joe and the volcano. I mean, it's always been worshiping the creation rather than the creator. And people today would say, well, we're, you know, we've got science. We're educated. Now we know better. Yeah, still worshiping creation, right? Global warming and their belief that they can somehow change the world that they neither created nor maintain. They believe they worship the creation. They deprive themselves of things in order for the betterment of mother earth. That is the worship of creating and the rejection of a creator. That's so true. Verse 24 and 25 says, therefore, God also gave them up to uncleanness and the lust of their hearts to dishonor their bodies among themselves who exchanged the truth of God for the lie. and worshiped and served the creature rather than the creator who is blessed forever. Amen. So as a consequence of their idolatry, what does God do? He withdraws his restraining grace. He withdraws his intervention, his protection. And this is a very pivotal moment in a society that forgets God and goes their own way when God gives them over to their own lusts. This is where verse 26 on through verse 32 begins to really display that, what it looks like and the things we're seeing today before our own eyes. And I would say now we're going to start this, what I call kind of a laundry list of things. As I said earlier, you know, if you were to read the headlines of any newspaper, I don't even know if newspapers still exist, but if you were to read the headlines online, they would all fall within this category. That's why verse 26 says, for this cause, God gave them up unto vile affections. This is God basically taking his hands off, as you said, releasing the restraint. I remember a hot wire fence on the farm as a kid. Don't touch that hot wire fence. It will shock you. I'd get over there messing around and they would say, Hey, get away from the fence. You're going to get shocked. I'd get over there messing around. And then finally, you know, I'd get a blade of grass and I'd touch the fence with it. You know, it's not shot with messing with a fence. You're going to get shocked. Then finally my dad got to a point where he said. I think the only way he's going to learn this is to touch the fence. Uh, so he ceased to warn me. He ceased to command me to get away. He said, I'm gonna leave Harold up to Harold. And guess what happened? Wade, I reached out and touched the fence and boy, did I ever get a shock? Sure. This is what we're looking at from verse 26 down through verse 32. God has said, I've warned you through profits. I've warned you through nature. I've ruined, warned you through your conscience. Now I'm going to let you do what you're just dead set on doing. He hands over to vile affections. What's the telltale sign it's there in verse 26. Their women, even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature. This is lesbianism. This is homosexuality. This is a symptom of God's restraint being taken off. Verse 27, likewise, also the men leaving the natural use of the woman burned in their lust one toward another. Men with men working that which is unseemly and receiving in themselves the recompense of their error, which was me. This was meant for them. The punishment that they're going to receive, the things that go along with this kind of lifestyle. are merely reaping the fruit that you've sown. I've heard people say, well, the Bible never explicitly condemns homosexuality. Have you ever heard that way? Well, the Bible actually gives it as evidence of a time when God says, I'm done with you. Right. So Sodom and Gomorrah was known for homosexuality. Gay people used to be called Sodomites. We have the word sodomy for a reason. But that was the telltale sign that the men of Sodom didn't want Lot's daughters. They wanted the men that were in his home. Right. That level of of unnaturalness that the King James calls it unseemly against nature, that that that thought process and those desires are what happens when God takes his hand off. Now, look at our country. You've always had homosexuals in every generation. Anytime they're openly accepted, that country is nearing, that nation is nearing the end of its existence as they know it. Whether it's Rome, whether it's the plane of Sodom and Gomorrah, or whether it's America today. They are entering the end. What do you think, Wade? Oh, absolutely. I mean, we are a nation where now it is pushed. It is promoted to degrees that we have never seen, never seen in history. Have you ever known of any type of a of a government building such as the White House displaying rainbow flags? And, um, you know, having parades, you know, June is pride month. So they're not only engaging in it, they are promoting it. They're teaching it. Right. And guess what? It's having its effect. The, what the generation Z. which is the current generation, is like 30% homosexual now, or they identify as that. So it's having its effect. It's raising up a generation of homosexuals that it's because it's being ingrained in them. Right. Yeah. It's so, so here's what Paul says to the Romans in verse 28. He says, even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind to do those things, which are not convenient, not proper, not normal. They're going out of their way to do it wrong. what Paul's saying, but Paul says that they didn't want to retain God in their knowledge. They wanted to have a world where there was no God. This is what John Lennon sang about way back in the 70s in his song, Imagine. Imagine a world with no God. It's easy if you try. They don't want any oversight. They want complete and total freedom from any restraint. They want to be able to do whatever they want unrestrained. Eventually, God will let them unrestrained. He'll hand them over to a reprobate mind. He'll allow them to carry out their wicked vile Um, desire. So look at verse 29, here's where Paul starts that laundry list. And it goes down through the end of verse 31. I won't be able to deal with all of them, but I'll just read it being filled with all unrighteousness. Fornication fornication is any sexual contact outside of marriage, right? We'll hear people say, well, I don't commit adultery. Well, you commit fornication. That's the same thing. Uh, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness, full of envy. And then it says murderers debate, deceit, malignity, whisperers. That means gossips. Yeah. I mean, are we not a nation of gossips? We have magazines just devoted to gossip. We have TMZ that just is a TV show in a whole media complex just devoted to gossip. Yeah. Yeah. There are people that get up every day and look for what the latest gossip is. This is our country versus back biters, haters of God. I would say that's where we're at. It's not enough. to say, I don't go to church. I don't want to have to see a church. It's not to say, I don't pray. They say, I don't want you to pray. That's the hater of God. Deceitful, proud boy. If there was ever a time we were proud, it was this. Boasters inventors of evil things. This means they find all new ways to sin. And my stars, we live in a day where that is happening, don't we? Yes. Yes. All right. Look at this last one in verse 30 disobedient to parents. There has never been a time in American history where children have been this blatantly disobedient to their parents across the board. Right. I'm talking about schools. Can't discipline children. Parents don't discipline children. We're in a timeframe where people have been prosecuted for spanking their children. Yeah. We live in a time where we're told to count to 10 and then the parents are blamed for the child's position. Mm-hmm. And this disobedience is at all. It's at an all time highway. I've seen kids do. I've always said, man, if I did that to my parents, I wouldn't be alive today. Sure. Sure. It's just unreal. All right. Verse 31, we got to get through this long list without understanding. I think you covered, covered that covenant breakers without natural affection. That means moms don't love their children. It means dads doesn't love their kids. It means husbands don't love their wives. It means children don't love their parents. Yeah. That's the day we live in. If that right there was, was the only telltale sign. We've got people who just throw their parents in a nursing facility, never check on them, never call them. Don't care a thing in the world about the care of their parents until they're dead and they get to divide their stuff. That is true. I see this over and over. Yes. The mothers that walk away from their children, not because they can't feed them and care for them, but because they're interfering with the lifestyle they want to live. They'll go into an abortion clinic and have their living child dismembered and pulled out of their body because they don't want the responsibility of caring for it. Right. We are in a time where without natural affection is at an all-time high. And then it says, implacable and unmerciful. Now, that list, which we've looked at some of them in depth, others we've just read, verse 32 is the conclusion of the wrath of God on a nation. who knowing the judgment of God, that they, which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them. They know that this is against the law of nature. They know that man and man wasn't designed to work this way. Woman and woman wasn't designed to work this way. Mother and daughter, a father and son. They know that this relationship should be one of love and compassion. They don't have love and compassion for one another. They know children are not to obey their parents. They don't do it. What the text says is they know it's wrong. They know it's worthy of death. They not only do it, but they have pleasure in doing it. Now, let me illustrate that a little bit. We have television shows that illustrate and glorify disobedient children, rebellious youth that do whatever they want and despise their parents. We have television shows that magnify and glorify fornication, homosexuality, uh, coveting all of the things we've mentioned. Yeah. They have pleasure in seeing it. They read about it. They watch it, they listen to it, they enjoy it, and they even promote it. Wade, if the wrath of God is not on America right now, I don't know what the wrath of God would look like. Sure, sure. Yeah, yeah. We are undoubtedly under experiencing right now the wrath of God by simply God giving us over to reprobate mind. And I guess the biggest question is this, Harold, is there any hope? Is there you know, we're we're looking at a very dire situation. Romans one very dire as we look at these as these verses. Um, but is there any hope? Well, our hope was the Christian do. Yeah. The Christian is told to endure. Yeah. You and I would love to see a complete and total revival in America. We would love to see this country fall on their knees before a Holy God, confess their sins, turn away from them a wholesale, um, uh, rejection of all the stuff mentioned in verses 28 through 31, and just see all that put aside and a return to God. But. What does a Christian do if God doesn't grant us a national revival? He's done it in the past, but I don't know as though our country has ever been this far down the wrath of God trail. I don't know any country that's been as far down this road as we are that's ever came back. I don't. Um, you might see it in pockets of Israel in the old Testament where they were extremely wicked and God kind of stamped out an area and there was a revival, but the level of wickedness mentioned here was what you saw in Israel before they were carried away into Babylon. Mm hmm. Right. Right. This is the level of wickedness. So what are we to do? Well, we're to be faithful, Wade. Sure. We're to live a lifestyle and keeping of what we profess in Christ. The only way anyone's going to be saved is to see something different. Yes. To live that life of difference. We're to have we're to be ready to give an answer for the faith that we have in Christ. Mm hmm. And we're also ready to suffer the consequences for living a life of faith in Christ. Yeah. And, you know, we we may not be able to save the nation, but we can save our family. Yeah, we can. We can raise up our family in the admonition and nurture of the Lord and teach them the truth and teach them that, hey, those who will live godly will suffer persecution. And there is just a there's just an onslaught today. It just seems that there's a target upon those who are Bible-believing Christians. You know, I wish our nation hated sin with the same hatred that they hate Bible-believing conservative Christians. But that's the world in which we live in. But it is true. The only hope that we have as a nation is the gospel of Jesus Christ. And we as Christians, being bold enough to proclaim it, being bold enough to live out a godly life for all to see. Now, whether God brings a revival, that is something we should pray for, and that is ultimately up to the Lord himself. But we should do what we know is right, and that is to live by God's word, teach our family the word of God, Let me speak here. I deal with a lot of pastors throughout the week. I'm in contact with a lot of preachers around the country. I'm hearing over and over, not so much from pastors I know, but pastors they know. They're calling me and they're telling me, Brother Harold, there's a pastor down the road for me. His wife of 43 years has left him. She said she's tired of living this life. She's ready to go experience life. And so she's leaving her husband to go live a life of. After 43 years of marriage, she wants to be promiscuous, be able to sleep around and, and fornicate just like what we've said is occurring. I'm hearing that not just here and there. I'm hearing that more and more from pastors saying they've got church members that are divorcing. They've got children that are going off into homosexuality and they're, they're, they're sorrowful for it. And they're like, what do I do? And sadly enough, this is just the way it's going to be. These people are looking at the world around them and they want what the world has, not what God's offering. And my advice to the Christian here is to be faithful. I'm not going to give an account for what America did while I was a pastor. I'm not even going to give an account for what Arkansas did while you and I pastor here. I'm not going to give an account for even the community I live in. Yeah, I, my realm primarily is what I Harold Smith have done, what you Wade Lentz have done. And on top of that, the family that we've raised and on top of that, the church that we've shepherded. Yeah. Those are what we give an account for. That's where we can really have influence and impact. Don't look at what the world's doing. Don't look at what Britney Spears and Taylor Swift and Travis Kelsey and whatever, whoever's the name of the day. It doesn't matter what they say. It doesn't matter that we have a Taylor Swift Bible now. What we've got to be focused on is, am I in the Bible? Am I reading the Word of God? Am I preparing myself to lead my home and shepherd my church that the Lord's given me responsibility for. Those are the things that you and I can focus on. If all we do is look at what's going on in the world, what other professing Christians are doing, we're going to get discouraged and want to quit. But if we stay buried in the word of God, we stay active in prayer. We're not going to be distracted by the world's delights, you know, no longer charmed by the world's delights is the hymn writers. That's right. Yeah. I'm reminded too, of what Paul said to Timothy and, uh, second Timothy chapter four, verse 12, when he is, you know, he's telling Timothy, Hey, persecution is coming. It's going to get bad, but there is laid up for me. a crown of righteousness, but not for me only, but for all those who love his appearing. So in other words, Timothy, don't get your mind just focused on the here and now the temporal things, get your mind focused upon the eternal things, those things that will last forever. And we do hasten. We do look forward to the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, where he will make all things new. And so we pray that this podcast, as it may sound like a dire message, but really, really, it's a it's a positive one. As we know, as Christians, we win in the end. And to that, Harold, thank you for getting together today with me and recording this podcast. We pray it's a blessing to all who hear it. May the Lord bless you all.