Good to have you this morning. We're going to be continuing on. Pastor Tim taught last Sunday, and we'll be carrying on with the issue on the family. And I just want you to know that after he said that we were not perfect parents, how dare him say we were not perfect parents, that this morning I'm getting even. But let's go ahead and ask God's blessing upon this anyway, OK? Let's bow for prayer. Our Father, we are so grateful for your word, for we know that the essence of all family dysfunction can be corrected through obedience to the word of God. I ask, Father, that you would bless us in these weeks ahead as we look to the condition of society, as well as looking to the remedy for where we are going as a civilization. So, Father, I ask you to bless us as we begin to look at the foundation of family and pray that you will just bless our time together in these weeks ahead. Thank you for our time. In Jesus' precious name, Amen. Well, as far as getting even goes, I'll just start with this. You're with somebody shut that door there. Oh, OK, you got somebody coming in. Great. It helps a little bit if the door shut. I think Pastor Tim, little Timmy was probably seven or eight. Well, obviously, he was seven or eight at one time, maybe nine. But anyway, we gave as parents often do give our children multivitamins. So we gave him Micah multivitamin, Tim a multivitamin. And so we didn't think any more about it. And we saw him, we gave it to him there in the kitchen and they took the vitamin. Well, what we didn't know was his little Timmy was going over to the bathroom and spitting it out in the toilet. And he flushed it. So I don't know how long this is going on. Well, one day when I went in there to answer the phone, I saw it. He forgot to flush it. Lo and behold, we had a problem for about a day. So we sat Mike and Tim both down and we said, now, who did it? Neither would admit it. And this is the first time that determined, you know, we're looking at two boys. One of them we know is guilty. There is no doubt about one of them is guilty. And in case you didn't know, your pastor's a stubborn little boy. Well, he did repent by the end of the day and everything was good. I've got a lot more, so we'll just let that go for right now. I entitled this today assault on the family, which we'll be talking about and looking at that, but probably it also should be called the foundation of the family because the family is not man's idea. The family was God's idea. God created the family. And he is the one who loves the family dearly, as I think you will see. So we probably should say that. I also want to give a warning, not a warning, but I mean, I just want to explain to you that honestly, you need to understand that probably what you're going to hear in the next weeks is counterculture. It will not be, well, it won't be politically correct, but it will also be going upstream against the culture. But we have to understand that I don't really make any apologies for that, because if I go back to, say, the 1950s and I see where things have gone. What I do understand, though, after him talking first about self-esteem, and we got all these things now, we got all this psychologizing of our kids, we got all of this, oh no, you don't discipline your kids, it's harmful, you go on and on. We have all of these things happening, but I just want to remind you that God's Word doesn't change, it's the same. It was the same in 1950, and it's the same now. So I know I'm going contrary to the culture. Proverbs chapter 3 verse 33 says this, the Lord blesses the home of the righteous. The Lord blesses the home of the righteous. That's beautiful. It's been said that the nearest thing to heaven on this earth is the home where husband and wife and children, parents, all are living in love and peace and harmony for the Lord Jesus Christ. And it's also been said that the nearest thing to hell on earth is an ungodly home, damaged by sin, divorce, quarreling, bickering, alcoholism, Abandonment of the children to the devil because of this and that. All kinds of wickedness. And I think, you know, we get the point, don't we? We get the point. Now, in the wisdom of God, the family is the smallest complete unit of society on earth. And as the family goes, so goes the nation. And ultimately, the civilization. No nation has ever risen higher morally, intellectually, or spiritually than the families of which that nation is composed. If we attack the problems of society, the problems of dysfunctional families, if we attack this by combating crime, in hiring more police, we combat violence, it's all got to begin in the home because if it doesn't, it's really useless. Because it starts in the home, the basic fabric of all of society which God has created. Until the homes of our nation, and that means the parents, the husband and the wife, turn to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ, our country will continue to deteriorate morally. The home is the building block of society. And so when we see now the increase of dysfunctional families, we understand that this building block of society, blocks are being taken out. You see? And once enough blocks are taken out of the foundation, it will crumble. And we are in a perilous situation today. That's why We battle, that's why we teach truth, that's why we have church, that's why we preach the gospel, because these are the answers to the problems that God gives. A while back, I had a sermon entitled, from Psalm 11-3, when the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do? Good question, because today, society is morally bankrupt, and I don't need to go on and on and tell you that. We can talk about a husband, a wife, parents' responsibilities, children's responsibilities. We can go on and on in that, but I want to say this. If we are not right with our God, those things are useless and meaningless, probably much like what Solomon said, vanity all is vanity. Because it comes back to the point that it's the Bible that has the answers. And we have a responsibility to know what those answers are by knowing his word and knowing our God. I want to illustrate this in just a minute from the Ten Commandments. But I want to explain, first of all, I want to talk about three institutions that are entwined together. And there's a reason why God did it. First of all, government. When you look at such passages as Genesis 9, 5 and 6, and then you look at Romans 13, we realize from both Old and New Testament that God has designed government. God clearly established government for the prevention of chaos, which, of course, is for the protection of the family. God had the family in mind when he created government. OK, it's for the protection of the family, that integral part of society that is necessary. All right. We also know the church, Acts chapter two, the body of Christ, God established and has the body of Christ. We'll talk about the universal church being all believers. But guess what? That is manifested locally in the local church. And so the true church of Jesus Christ is the one that is composed of believers. But that is manifested as a our little haven, if you will. So that though we believe that the church, when I talk about universal, the universal church, it's all believers, whether they're dead or going to be born in the future or wherever they're at. But we do know that God created the church for the family. All right. So that brings me to the next one. All right. Now you've got the family that precious. It's so close to the heart of God, and, you know, he established the family structure, which Satan is trying to destroy. There is no doubt about that. You can go all the way back to the fall of Genesis three to note that Satan is out the serpent. He is out to destroy family. There is no doubt about it. And we will be looking at some of that. As we look at society now, the society and the culture in which we live, we see that morally. And actually, many other ways. We're turned upside down, right has become wrong and wrong has become right. What is normal has been flipped and is abnormal. Let me give you just one illustration. We know that the Marriage Act is being greatly discussed today. The Supreme Court is going to make a decision on this same sex marriage soon. I don't know if you also heard a few weeks ago, and maybe I didn't get it quite right, so you can correct me if I didn't, but it was, I don't know if you heard this poll, 48 percent, I think it was female, women I think, Forty-eight percent of women do not want to marry. They live together. Forty-eight percent of women are living together without marriage. They are cohabitating together. Now, what is the irony of this? What is upside down about this? What are we having today? Gays want to marry. But guess what? A majority of heterosexuals don't want to marry. Is that upside down? Biblically? Yeah. It's twisted. It's upside down. Now, that's just one illustration because there's a lot more. But God established the family for the preservation of society. No doubt about that. But more importantly, for the promotion of the redemption of mankind. He uses the family to pass on the knowledge of God and his word, which contains the gospel. I want you to look with me at Psalm 78. Psalm 78. I won't spend a lot of time here, but I want to make sure you understand the emphasis of this. This is God's heart. In Psalm 78, He relates much of the history of Israel. Unfortunately, it is the negative history of Israel, but at the beginning, He establishes how it's supposed to be. So I want to begin reading in Psalm 78. I'll just read the first seven verses. Give ear, O my people, to my law. Incline your ears to the words of my mouth. I will open my mouth in a parable. I will utter dark sayings of old, which we have heard and known and our fathers have told us. We will not hide them from their children, telling to the generation to come the praises of the Lord and his strength and his wonderful works that he has done. For he established a testimony in Jacob and appointed a law in Israel. which he commanded our fathers, that they should make them known to their children, that the generation to come might know them, the children who would be born, that they may arise and declare them to their children, that they may set their hope in God." That should be the goal of every parent. that they may set their children's hope in God. And it's not easy and it's not done overnight. And it goes on to say, and not forget the works of God, but keep his commandments. You see how the perpetuation of the gospel is brought to the family over and over and over. But verse 8 says, and may not be like their fathers, a stubborn and rebellious generation, a generation that did not set its heart aright. And then it goes on, and if you read the rest of this, you'll see the history of Israel. Up and down. Paganism. Other gods over and over, and then they repent and they come back and God has mercy. And this cycle goes over and over. It's much like the book of Judges. If you read the book of Judges, you will find that period of history when man did what was right in his own eyes. And yet God would be merciful, but then he judged them with nations. And this cycle goes on and on. Unfortunately, that is the sad part of Israeli history there. But he set the standard and that's what we've got to note. That we as parents, as grandparents, as a single or rather husband and wife together, they have influence on cousins, children, they may have children of their own. It's all there folks. That's what we do is we perpetuate the truth, the gospel through this means. Now, I think you can see. Okay, so the family promotes the blessings of society. as well as being the avenue that God chooses to pass on knowledge about himself and generations. All right, now he has government established by God for the protection of society, which is the protection of family. And then you have the church, the bride of Christ, the local church manifested then into the local church, and it functions as a haven for the family. I really feel sorry for dysfunctional families. For those people who do not have a church to go to in the midst of the struggles. God designed the church to be that haven for us, his children. And it is tragic when people neglect the church. I understand neglecting a church that does not preach the gospel, that doesn't even have believers in it. So we're obviously not talking about that kind of a church, are we? The church I think is a heaven on earth. It's probably the closest thing, the church and the family together. And I know many of you have testified to me how much you love this church. But you know why you love it? You love it because the people here, the majority of the people here love to hear the word of God because our pastor teaches the word of God and because it's a haven to come together. You all work out there in that wicked world. We need that shot in the arm. We come together, we get to visit, we have fellowship. That's beautiful, folks. That's just the foretaste of heaven. That's what it is. That's why we need it. Now. The law of Moses, what does that have in common with what we're talking about? Well, I want to show that to you now, I'm just going to mention the Ten Commandments. If you want to turn to Exodus 20, you can, but I'm going to go through them fairly quick. I want you to understand that the Ten Commandments are divided in three sections. Most of you probably already know that. Let's go to the first section. I'm going to read the first four commandments. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. All right. What do you notice about this? It's all dealing with our relationship to God. Our relationship to God. This is no accident, by the way. This is the word of God. God always does it right, and he knows what he's doing. Because your relationship to God is more important than your relationship to your wife, your children, your pastor, your friends, or anybody else. That is the single most important relationship you can possibly have above all others. All right, now let's look at 5, 6, and 7. This is the fifth, sixth, and seventh commandment. Honor thy father and thy mother. Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Obviously, those things affect the family. Respect is what is needed. Children must respect and honor their father and their mother, or it hampers and hinders and destroys families. Thou shalt not kill. What do you mean by that? Well, it means thou shalt not murder. Let me tell you how that happens. I had in a former pastorate, had a missions board member on my team that killed his wife. and then attempted to kill his two older daughters and let the third one, the youngest one, live because she was too young to know anything. Unfortunately for him, one of the daughters lived to testify against her father. I remember walking out of the courthouse when it was all over. And after he confessed to it, finally, because he was being spared capital punishment. And he's in prison the rest of his life today. But I remember walking out of the courthouse and I was with a member of our church. And I was in tears. Because I said, Satan just disintegrated a family in my church. Murder destroys families. And this family was like it just instantly was off the face of the earth. I saw Satan do that firsthand. All right, so this is pretty clear now. That that is these things harm family and therefore family. Look at the next one, eight, nine and 10. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor. Thou shalt not covet. OK. It's pretty obvious, isn't it? Alright, stealing, bearing false witness, coveting, that deals with people around us, our neighbors, people in our church, society around us, okay? So we have it for the family in 5, 6, and 7, now it's society around us. These three deal with attitudes, practices, and things that our family is involved in all the time. Your children go to school, we go to church, we have neighbors, okay? So I want you to understand that point. But now, here is the point we must not miss. And that is the order of the commandments. Remember what I said? The first four? Our relationship to God. Listen. Our vertical relationship clearly affects our horizontal relationship. Our relationship to God is the most important thing. It must be right before we have proper relationships with others. It's critical, folks, not getting along with people here complaining about our jobs, complaining about our church, complaining about our spouse, complaining about this or whatever it is, we're very unhappy. If you're not right with God, your home life and everything else you do will be not right either. If you're one of these persons complaining about everything in life, this is bad, this is bad. I don't care whether you're a Christian or not a Christian. And you're saying everything in life. We know people like and maybe you found yourself in a situation. Nothing is right. Let me tell you, you're not right with God. It's that simple. That doesn't mean we don't go through trials. But what I'm saying is your joy and your happiness comes from God first. and your relationship with him. And then everything else falls together. It doesn't mean you won't fail. It doesn't mean sometimes you won't get discouraged or whatever, but God will bring you out of it because your relationship to him is right. That is critical, folks, whether we're talking about spousal relationships or parenting, either one, it's critical and we must know that. So I want to start it out like that. I want us to understand even there in looking at the law of Moses, we see this truth. pointed out there. All right, it's clear that God cares for the family. For marriage and for children. His very law is a reflection of that. Understand, without a doubt. God can heal any bad home situation. I don't care what it is, and quite frankly, we should say that there is none of us whose home is so good that God's impressed, but neither is there anyone here or any one of us where our home is so bad that God cannot set it right when we are obedient to Him. And I'm going to say this, because we'll be talking a little bit more about it later. Fathers, it starts with you. I don't like being hard on the man, because then it's hard on me. But Fathers, it begins with you. We'll talk more about that. I think it's interesting, the fifth commandment. The fifth commandment, clearly, honor your father and your mother that your days may be long in the land which the Lord your God gives you. The commandment with promise, how beautiful that is. And there we see it clearly deals with home and parents, of course, in particular, doesn't it? It means we should look up to those whom God has entrusted as our authority. as it placed us over. In other words, we honor, we obey, and we're grateful for our authorities and our parents being the first one that we grow up in. The background of this commandment is to be found in the natural human dislike of authority. That's why the family is so important in God's economy. If children are not taught to respect their parents, but allowed to get away with disobeying and dishonoring, they will rebel. And worse, if children are allowed to punch a parent, and I've seen it happen at the grocery store, you've seen it in places, where children actually slap or hit their mother, or punch them in the stomach. That is so disgustful. When I see it, if it's at the grocery store or whatever, it just wants me to go over and grab that kid and do what she hasn't done. But I realize I'll end up in jail if I do it. So, you know, you just sit there and you grit your teeth when you see that. But folks, okay, my second get-even story. When your pastor, Timmy, was about two and a half years old, he was at home with mother. I was gone working or playing or whatever I was doing. I wasn't home. And most of the time when these, you know, these major things come up, it seems like the wife's always alone. I don't know why that is. But anyway, Joyce was there and she had Timmy very close to him and he raised his hand like he was going to hit her. And so she wisely took his hand, put him over her knee. Now, he's only two and a half. She didn't do it when he was 18. OK, but there she put him over her knee and spanked him until there was pain enough for him to recognize something wasn't quite right. But this is what she said to him before she spanked him. She said to me, or maybe dear, whatever she said, I don't know, but it was very loving, but firm. I love you too much to let you be abandoned and become the devil's child. And I will not let you be disobedient and spanked. And do you know what? He never raised his hand again because he was taught at a young age. That means pain. I don't think I want any pain, but as they get older, it translates into respect. He didn't do it again until yesterday. He did kind of threaten her with something. He was over it. He got he was but. You know, when we think about that time, we really I want you to understand that Joyce won that battle. You have to understand you're in a war for your children. And if you don't understand that, you better first of all understand they're already in a war from the devil. I'll tell you the most precarious person in the world today and the most dangerous to be killed by the devil are children. I have never seen it. I've been reading books about Sobibor and World War II so much that it just blows my mind how many children were murdered and killed. And I look today, whether it's abortion or whatever, children, it's dangerous to be a child. So we need to understand, parents, that your children are already in a war. Now you must win the battles of your war with your child. George and I used to talk about this. We believe that roughly there are three to four major battles you will have with a child when they're young and they begin to grow up. And those battles are usually over probably by, if you're doing your job, they'll be over by five, six, seven, eight, somewhere around in there. And they're just major things like this one with Pastor Tim I just told you about. That was defiance. And you know, even small children can dig their heels into the sand. Boy, can they. We know that, don't they? Even if they can't walk, they can still dig their heels into the sand. And you don't understand. What's the matter? Everything was going just great, and all of a sudden, you're so stubborn. And you just sit back, and you won't do it. You tell them to do something, they won't do it. Okay. This is a major battle. This is how we looked at it. Joyce won that battle. We believe that there are three or four that you'll go through before you begin to see success as a parent later on down the line. And I think your goal is when you start. That's why it says parent early. That's why it says discipline early. That's the whole reason for it. Because by the time you're 7, 8, 9, 10, most likely you won't have to spank anymore or it would be rare. OK, so this is what you want to do. This is where you want. This is where you want to move. And we'll talk a little bit more about that later. But I want to understand it's much easier to win this battle at age three than it is age 10. Or age 13. Or age 60. If you wait that long, it may be too late for that aspect of it, it's never too late in the sense that God can always save your children and he can work in their lives in other ways. Problem is, as parents, when we don't do our job in the years that God has given us to proclaim the gospel to them, make them understand what sinners they are, and what Jesus Christ came to do, and do our job in discipline to require obedience as the head of the home, then what happens is God has to take over. And when God takes over, I'm going to tell you, it's more painful at 21 to be disciplined by God than it would have been by you as a parent when you're young. Too often you see that at two and a half, I keep talking about two and a half, but parents, all they want, of course, this is the culture. That's why I say we're going against the culture, but they want to reason with the two and a half. Don't you know that that'll hurt mommy's tummy? Don't you know that that will hurt your little brother if you hit him on the head? No, they don't know. That's why they have you. God made you the parent. You are in charge and you are to teach them. You don't reason with a two and a half year old. He can't reason unless you're a two and a half year old. Then you can reason, figure out how a two and a half year old thinks. But if you're not two and a half, you don't know how they're thinking. And the best thing you can do is take control of your family and demand obedience and respect will follow. We have a world today, even in the Christian world, they always want a reason. They got a reason. The child needs to know God put you in charge. I am the parent. And in the younger age, you don't have to give a reason why you demand obedience. That's not required. God doesn't say you have to do that. Now, it does come naturally as the child begins to grow a little older. Yes, as my kids got older or whatever, seven, eight, nine, ten, five, depending on the situation, you begin to say, now, this is why certain things, OK, that more will hurt you. OK, there'll be certain things. But you've got to understand when you've got a small two year old child, don't try to reason with them. They don't need that. What they need to know is that you're the parent. Now, why do I say everything I'm saying? Listen, if children are not taught to respect their parents, but allowed to get away with these things, they will rebel against other forms of authority. If they disobey their parents and disrespect them, they will disobey the laws of the state. If they do not respect their parents, they will not respect their teachers and the teacher will always be at fault. And unfortunately, The worst is, if they do not honor their parents, they will not honor God. They have never been taught to respect authority. Then, God has to take over for your child. If you are a diligent parent praying for their salvation, I believe God will answer that prayer most likely. But you have to understand something. God is going to take your older child through the woodshed. You just need to be there to comfort him. Keep telling him about God and keep doing what you can do. But I'm telling you, he'll come. That's just, you might say, the laws of nature. Listen, the laws of God. Let me say it that way. But in this commandment, we see clearly the need for the discipline of children, a responsibility which the Bible is explicit. We all know about Proverbs 22, 6. Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old, he will not depart from it. We basically read that. We think we know what it says. Later on, I want to unpack that verse. I think you will be surprised at the depth of the truth of what that's really saying. And so I do want to share that with you later. Proverbs 19.18 says, Discipline your son while there is hope. Do not set your heart on his destruction. Now, we don't set our heart on their destruction. But if we don't discipline, we are. It's the same as if we did. And yet I've heard people, I've heard parents say, I love my child too much to spank him. I love my child too much. I want to let him have this. I want to let him play it. I want him to enjoy life. I want mine to enjoy life too when they're older as well. Anyway, I'm getting I'm sorry about that. I'm going on here over here. I got to get back to the center and talk about what we're talking about. All right. Family. God's will for the family is clearly established, but it was thwarted by the fall. All right. Genesis, Chapter three. Ultimately, the serpent. We know the story of the serpent. And we know the fact that this is the devil, the devil assaults the families. Turn with me to First Timothy, Chapter four. First Timothy chapter four. I really appreciate Pastor Kim last week in. He gave us chapter 3, verse 16. Remember that verse that says, where Paul says in chapter 1 Timothy 3, 16 or 15, but if I am delayed, I write so that you may know how you ought to conduct yourself in the house of God, which is the church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth. And without controversy, there is a great mystery of godliness goes on about God manifested in the flesh. The gospel and all that. So here we are. And Tim explained that, frankly, what we have here, without a doubt, is the role of the church. We are the pillar. Here's a pillar, OK? You know what a pillar is? It supports, right? That's what a pillar does. But do you know that a pillar won't stand very long if it doesn't have a foundation? So the ground, the pillar support and ground is the foundation. The church is the ground. And the pillar, which what? Supports truth and supports the gospel. That's our goal. Now, keeping that in mind, that's what the church is supposed to be. Let's go to chapter 4, verse 1. Now, the Spirit expressly says in the latter times, some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons. Verse 1 explicitly says that in the latter times, some will fall away from the faith. It's an apostasy, yes, in the latter days. But what I want you to notice, it says deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons. So what does that say? Satan has a Bible too. Satan has a Bible that he promotes. There are doctrines and the teachings of demons. And that's what he does. That is what he is involved in doing. He has his own Bible. Oh, he knows what God's Word says. He knows it better than we do. There's no doubt about it. But he has his own. And it is that Bible that he is promoting. Okay? Now, question. What is the means of spreading his Bible doctrines? Look at verse 2. Speaking lies in hypocrisy. having their own conscience seared with a hot iron. How do they do it? Speaking lies. Speaking lies and deceiving is how they spread Satan's doctrine. Speaking lies. They foster and promote lies. Same sex marriage is one of them. You can just go on, can't you? There's all kinds of things today that we are that we are constantly bombarded with and you can see them and it even affects Christians, unfortunately. And that's sad. But the devil speaks lies. All right. What then is Satan's agenda? Let me just kind of phrase it that way. What is his agenda? Verse three, forbidding to marry. and commanding to abstain from foods which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth. What is his agenda? In his lies, in his doctrine, in his Bible that he is spreading is, obviously, forbidding to marry and abstaining from food. Now, that's interesting, because you think, well, he spent all his time on debunking the deity of Christ and switching the gospel, doing whatever he has to do. You know, here, look what he's doing, forbidding the Mary and abstaining from foods. Why would he do that? Well, it's a warning to the church that that's the way it's going to be in the latter days as they fall from the truth, a departure from sound doctrine. Accepting unsound doctrine. How many times have you heard in the last, I don't know, whatever, ten years? Have you heard that doctrine doesn't matter? Well, you hear that all the time, don't we? Well, doctrine just doesn't matter. We just need to love each other. Some shall depart from the faith. That's a doctrinal apostasy as well, okay? The philosophy today is, no, in most churches, hey, man, I'm telling you, doctrine divides. We need to all come together and love Jesus, and we're going to unite, and everybody who loves Jesus, we're going to come together. The only problem is which Jesus. But you remember what Pastor Tim said just not too long ago, I don't remember, it was last week. He said that when we compromise with other religions or organizations that we know are not biblical, truth always suffers. You can't mix truth with error and come up with truth. Doctrine divides. You know what? They're right. Doctrine does divide. And do you know what? That's not negative. That's positive. Because whether doctrine divides in a family, or divides in a church, or divides anywhere else, it makes truth come out. Because those who are in truth pull away from those who are in false. I've seen that happen in my own family. The Bible's clear about that. The Gospel divides families. So they're actually right. But, you know, without doctrine, you don't really have the real Christ. You don't have you know, you don't have sin. You don't have hell. You don't have anything else. It's OK. Well, this thing of doctrines doesn't matter. Here's my point. When you get into that, we know churches, there's a lot of churches here right here in Kansas City. Some of us know people will go there. You know, doctrine doesn't matter. Understand that's from Satan's Bible. Doctrine doesn't matter, that is Satan's words. There is a demonic influence today that is so powerful, seeking to seduce you and your family, your loved ones away from truth. Now, look again at that agenda, forbidding to marry and abstaining from food. Forbidding to marry. Now, what does that mean? Well, I maintain that it means at least three things. Forced celibacy. We're familiar with that. It can affect men and women alike. Depending on religion or culture or maybe somewhere remotely in the world, whatever for celibacy. I believe that's involved, but I also believe same sex marriage is involved. Why? Because there's no procreation. God says that's an abomination. That is no family. Same sex marriage is not family. Period. Plain and simple. It's just not. But what's the other one I think is living together, cohabitating together. Now, isn't that interesting? Think about this. Okay, forced celibacy, homosexual marriage, living together or cohabitating together. Notice all three have something in common. They all abolish the family. Satan is so smart. He's so much smarter than we are. It is really amazing. Because he doesn't need to talk about, especially in this church, he wouldn't dare come in and start saying Christ is not really God. He wouldn't dare. But he can sure attack us in a lot of other ways. He is. And it's amazing to me because you would think, like I said, he'd be on these other major big doctrinal things. No. Do you know what he uses to destroy sex and food? Amazing. That's not hard to figure out if you just watch TV. What is he using to destroy you and your children? Sex and food. Sex and food. And we've got a world of people cohabitating together. You know, I remember many, many years ago, I probably preached the same sermon 40 or 35 years ago. But it amazed me there. It was usually the younger generation that was living together, cohabitating. Now, the old people are just as much. You've got almost as many old people cohabitating together. God forbid, it's just all right now. Next, it says, OK, good. I got about five minutes abstaining from food. OK. Forbidding to marry, of course, devalues marriage. But guess what? Abstaining from food, what we do is we exaggerate one food or the other. We put a value on this food and we devalue another food or completely say you can't have it. I mean, I grew up hearing this. Don't eat pork. Can't eat pork. You know, in the first place, folks, not eating pork is only for Israel. That's just the way it is. Eat only veggies. Just eat vegetables. And I maintain, if all you eat is carrots, that's rabbit food. Frankly, I don't care for just rabbit food. I like a little bit of rabbit food with my steak. And I'm not wrong. And I'll tell you why. Because God said I'm not wrong. But what happens is, it doesn't matter what it is, we get into these things and it's that kind of teaching that originates from Satan's Bible. And the way this is manifested is by overemphasizing, like I said, animals. Okay, the value, we all know about India, don't we? People starve and cattle and rats are running in the homes eating their grain. All of this, why? Because animals have been elevated to deity in some cases. This Eastern mysticism we now have in America, we just don't call it that. Listen, when you elevate animals to such a plane, you devalue human life. God, man, animals to serve man. Instead, we turn it around and we have animals, man, and if you're lucky, God's on the list, then he'd be number three. Do you see, what did I say, upside down? Yes, things are upside down. Animals to some people are more important than human beings. Animals today are given dominion over man when God said clearly that man has dominion over the animals. But today man serves the animals instead of the reverse. Oh, you can't go hunting. It's a sin. You killed Bambi. That's horrible. You know, we just can't go hunting. I mean, I've heard that said, and I'm going to just tell you the best word I know about what you tell me. The Bible teaches that we can't hunt hogwash. It's as good a word as any to be kind, you know. Hogwash. Killing an animal today for some people is like murder. Please understand, I am not against. I mean, I'm not at all for abusing animals. I don't I don't believe in that at all. I think that's wrong. Never should you abuse or torture animals. I would never suggest that. But I will say this. If killing an animal is murder. then God is the biggest murderer that exists. And he began in Genesis 3, he was the first to kill animals to clothe Adam and Eve, with all kinds of theological implications. So yes, I would say God's the biggest murderer. Plus, keep in mind, you remember what, how about all the sacrifices? You couldn't have a place to contain, it'd be an ocean of blood if you collected all the blood, all the millions of sacrifices that God required of the children of Israel. Remember Acts chapter 10? We won't go there, don't have time. Give me just another minute here and we'll close. You remember Peter, the vision of the sheep? God said, here it is, kill and eat. What does that mean? Peter, go hunting and kill that pig. or kill that cow or whatever you want to and eat. And Peter, of course, was shocked at first, but the truth came out. Listen, folks, you know, the trend toward vegetarianism today is is if it's done because of moral reasons or spiritual reasons is wrong. Vegetarianism based on moral or spiritual reasons is unbiblical. Now, if you do it for health reasons, you feel or taste, maybe you just really don't like meat or maybe you have an allergy to it. That's not a problem. Of course not. If your doctor says for some reason you really and you've got to be, you know, I understand that's not what we're talking about, but it's the propaganda of PETA. and the likes of them, and you know about them, promoting, not killing animals. And the animals are, Pastor Till was sharing with me something a while back, I think he was teaching it to his class, about this one guy who's promoting all this, and he says, chickens, rats and mice, they're our brothers. I mean, this is very serious. This is what they're teaching our people in school. You know what's scary? Our young people are growing up to believe they've got to be a vegetarian. And it's affecting them now in the universities, And in the early 20s, we're seeing so much of that. It's unbelievable. I mean, you know, but Scripture says just the opposite. Man has dominion over the animals. Now, let me just briefly tell you what that means. It means when my brother mouse enters my house, I will have capital punishment for my brother. And if my brother cockroach walks in, I will stomp him to death. Because they're dirty and they spread disease. And they're not my brother, anyway. Food and marriage are gifts from God. In the book of Genesis, remember what God told Noah? I am now giving you meat to eat. God said, I gave you animals to clothe you, to keep you warm. I give you animals to eat. I give you animals for all these things. Enjoy your steaks, guys, and your hamburgers and your pork chops. Not too many. Don't eat it. You know, eat a healthy lifestyle, but enjoy life. Why would God say all these things about me to Noah if they were harmful or if if in some way I'm going to kill my brother or sister? No, no, no, none of that. And I will tell you, oh, by the way, did you know Isaiah 25, what it says about in the millennial kingdom, we will be eating choice meats, choice steak. That's going to be great. A banquet of choice meats. So you see, it's really. Wrong, I believe, to if you're going to be a vegetarian and you do it for the reasons of spirituality. So understand that God is very firm on this. And in verse four, well, I won't read this. My time is up. I'm sorry. I went over a few minutes. Apologize, ushers. Go ahead and open the doors. We're going to pick up next week and I'm going to be wanting to get into the marriage manual. The Bible has a marriage manual. Oftentimes, we want to know why things don't work. Do you ever sometimes really got to read the instructions? Sometimes when you read the instructions, you get it put together. That's what we'll do next week. God bless you. We'll see you in a week.