telling with book of Isaiah, the 28th chapter. Whoa, and it's the name, the title of this teaching is drink of the cup, the world, the church, and lay at the scene is, he's talking about Ephraim steel. And I think for the first 12 verses that are poor, like that 28 chapter, it says, Whoa, to the crown of pride to the drunkards of Ephraim. whose glorious beauty is a fading flower which are on the head of the fat valleys of them that are overcome with wine. They are overcome with wine. Behold, the Lord had a mighty and strong one which is a tempest of hell and a destroying storm as a flood of mighty waters overflowing, shall cast down to the earth with the hand. The crown of pride, the drunkards of Ephraim shall be trodden under feet. And the glorious beauty which is on the head of the fat valley shall be a fading flower as the hasty fruit before the summer, which when he that looketh upon it, seeth it, it is yet in his hand, he eateth it up. And that day shall the Lord of hosts be for a crown of glory and for a diadem of beauty unto the residue of his people. In other words, to the remnant of those people that are left to that residue. And for a spirit of judgment to him that said it in judgment, and for strength to them that turned about to the gate. But they also have erred through wine and through strong drink, or out of the way. The priest and the prophet have erred through strong drink. They are swallowed up of wine. They are out of the way through strong drink. They err in vision, they stumble in judgment, for all the tables are full of vomit and filthiness, so that there is no place clean. Whom shall he teach knowledge, and whom shall he make to understand doctrine?" And the people are kind of sarcastically saying this to Isaiah, since he was teaching the same way they felt he was teaching, as if he was teaching the children or whatever. So this is kind of said in a mocking tone, in mockery. And he says, who shall he make to understand doctrine? Them are weaned from milk and are drawn from the breast. For precept must be upon precept, precept on precept, line up on line, line up on line, hear little and doubt little. For with a stammering lips and another tongue will he speak to this people. To those whom he had said, this is the rest wherewith you may cause the weary to rest, and this is the refreshing, yet they would not hear. So God says he's gonna speak to these people in a different way since they wouldn't hear his prophets that he rose up early every morning and giving them that same message over and over. They were saying there were redundancy of that message was every time they come, here's another precept and here's another precept and a rule here and there a little bit or whatever. God says he's gonna speak to these people in a different way. He says, but the word of the Lord was unto them, precept upon precept, precept upon precept, line upon line, here a little and there a little, that they might go and fall backward and be broken and snared and taken. Wherefore, hear the word of the Lord, ye scornful men. that rule this people within Jerusalem. Because you have said we made a covenant with death and with hell, we are in agreement. When the overflowing scourge shall pass through it, it shall not come unto us. For we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehoods have we hid ourselves." He's saying that he's going to bring judgment upon these people of Ephraim. Ephraim was the northern tribe. It was the 13 tribes, the 12 tribes, well, the northern tribes, the 10 tribes to the north. It included all of Jacob's sons, plus the grandsons, which he gave an equal portion. If we would look at the blessings that he gave to Joseph's two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, whereas the tribe of Levi was the Levitical tribe, Most of them were scattered throughout, but they was concentrated in Judah, but they migrated down to Judah mostly when Jeroboam had came in because Israel had went into Golan tribe. I mean, Golan calf worship, plus the priest had left or whatever. seeing as I told you was literal and figurative, but we see that the detoxification is, the drunkenness is the spiritual doctrine, the spiritual drunkenness, and I think if you I guess y'all have heard Sunday's message, the Bible teaching from Sunday, but it was spiritual drunkenness, not so much a physical drunkenness or whatever, because nowadays, even with most people, you know that alcohol is a toxic combination. Intoxicate, from the word intoxicate, means to excite or stupefy by alcohol, a drug, especially to the point of where physical and mental control is markedly diminished, to excite or elate to the point of enthusiasm or friendly. And then again, the word poison is in there, because within that word intoxicate, It's the word toxin, because we know alcohol is also a poison. They use it as a disinfectant. And you've heard of people dying from alcohol poisoning from drinking it or consuming it too fast, where it hardens the liver, hardens the cirrhosis of the liver, a different thing. But the toxicity of alcohol taken different combinations at different times or whatever but in compatibility of when looking at it in the spiritual way as the New Testament says don't be drunk with wine be drunk in the spirit because alcohol wine is a marker and we went over some scriptures of that the other day I may go over a couple of more today but we're looking at it that Alcohol and wine is a marker and whoever partakes of it is not wise The Bible doesn't be at alcohol. Let me get that. It doesn't say that it forbids alcohol. You can't have alcohol But it's the same way with anything some things may not be what's good for one What another wouldn't couldn't tolerate some others can't tolerate you know, some people can drink one beer and be completely diminished and staggered where some people, some of the people across from where I used to live at or whatever, used to drink, wake up in the morning drinking a 40 ounce or whatever, they drink liquor or whatever. There's some people that have tried to have operations or whatever, their body's so over consumed with alcohol that they can't perform the surgery or whatever. They have to give them artificial alcohol or whatever because alcohol is an addictive substance or whatever. So alcohol influences you, it inhibits you. Influence, they call it, found since you can use so many drugs and different things to drive with they don't just call it drunk and driving I think they call it driving under the influence you know because it could be alcohol or some other drug or whatever. The word influence is the power capacity of causing an effect in an indirect or intangible way to sway and Alcohol has a way of swaying you away from what you really are. And it removes inhibition, so a lot of times it brings out really the worst of you, the worst of what's in you a lot of times. It makes you act out or whatever. You hear a lot of people say, well, that's that look of talking or whatever. Well, the alcohol has given that person a false courage or whatever. It didn't allow them to say what they were suppressing or wouldn't or would say when they're in a rational or normal mind, but since they're under drugs, it's like being under anesthesia or an influence of some other drug or something. You say things that's in your subconscious or things that you really mean, but you would rationalize and not say those things in a woke or alive capacity because of, you know, the harm or, you know, the problems it would cause or whatever, but by being Under the influence of alcohol or whatever, it causes you to say things that a normal, rational person wouldn't say or that cause other problems or whatever. The drunkard, in the book of Deuteronomy 21, 20-21, talks about the son or daughter that consumes alcohol. Now, there's no Old Testament scripture to show this, or where we've seen this actually happen. But this was one thing about alcohol and liquor, which God gave authority to some parents that if the children were addicted to it and was irrational or doing things, and it says, and they shall say unto the elders of the city, and in other words, If a parent's sons or their children was disobedient and was given alcohol and drugs or whatever, they would say, this is our son, stubborn and rebellious. He will not obey our voice. He's a glutton and a drunkard. And all of the men of the city shall stone him with stones that he died. So shall they put away evil from among you, and all Israel shall hear fear. That's what alcohol will drive you to it. We know that a lot of the different people in biblical times that were drunk were driven to do things that were not right. Like I say, something a rational, sane person wouldn't do or whatever. And that's because of our nature, human nature or whatever. And it brings those things to the top, and sometimes the worst of us come out. And he was saying that the tables was full of vomit and filth or whatever, and the worst of Ephraim had manifested itself, and that he was going to bring Assyria in. And that tribe ended up lost, that the northern tribes ended up a lost tribe. I got in your notes, there's references to drunkenness and drunkards in Psalms 69 and 12. Isaiah 28, 1 and 3, Nahum 1 and 10. The book of Proverbs 23 and 21 says, be not among winebibbers, among riotous eaters of flesh. For the drunkard and the glutton shall come to poverty, and drowsiness shall conclude a man with rags. So we see over-intoxication, over-consumption of food or eating or whatever, leads to a bad state of affairs with people. It says drunkenness, it'll bring you to poverty and clothe you with rags or whatever. And our body, we have to watch what we put in our body, whether it is what we're eating or what we're drinking. And the health of our body, since it's no longer our body, take better care of our bodies. And that's one thing God did when he was in the wilderness. He tried to govern the food or the consumption of the things that they put in the body and tried to tell them what's not to eat or what's good for you. So we have to be able to distinguish the clean from the unclean, what's right and what's not right. And we're not talking from the point of a legalistic point of view under the Old Testament about clean and unclean foods. But through our rationale, if you have high blood pressure, diabetes or whatever, there are certain things you shouldn't consume or eat. If you're overweight or in certain conditions or whatever, there are certain things that we should be trying to do to correct those because Even society is pointing to you that that's not a healthy lifestyle, that's not a healthy way to be, or that's something that you shouldn't be doing, or whatever, and that you shouldn't be, even more so with the Bible tell you, you know. And that overweightness and all those things and drunkenness, it causes slothfulness, for us to oversleep, to overindulge, to become sedentary, to become, There are so many things, and we'll do them as we go. The book of Joel says, awaken ye drunkards and weep and howl, all ye drinkers of wine, because of the new wine, for it is cut off from your mouth. And then 1 Corinthians 5 and 11 says, but now I have written unto you to not keep company. If a man that is called a brother be a fornicator, a covetous, an idolater, or a railer, or a drunkard, or an extortioner, which such as one know not to eat. Those type of people, drunkards, you won't exclude them from your association, your alliances, and your table, or whatever, because like I said, it's a lack of self-control. It's one thing, association, that's an evilness or wickedness, and that's overindulgence in alcohol, in anything, really, because that's what the sin of gluttony is. 1 Corinthians 6 and 9 says, Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived, neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor infeminate, no abuses of themselves with mankind, no thieves, no covetous, no drunkards. There you go. He put drunkards in there again. No revilers, no extortionists should inherit the kingdom of God. So drunkardness and being a drunkard could prohibit in your inheritance. It can take away from your inheritance in the kingdom of God. He said, if you could be drunk, be drunk with the spirit, which is spiritual intoxication, which is being full of the spirit, which is altogether different. And that's why I said, I think the drunkenness he's talking about is spiritual drunkenness. And the first person in the Bible, I think, that we come across that being a drunk or being drunk we see was Noah in the book of Genesis, the ninth chapter, the 21st verse. And you see what kind of problem it caused with his sons, and with the whole generation of Ham. Canaan's son, what effect it had, and Noah become a husbandman, and he was a drunkard. I know he had been through a whole lot of things, but there's no excuse or whatever, but he laid up there and got drunk, and became naked in his tent. And that's when his son seen him uncovered. And thus from there we see the fall of Canaan through that. Another lineage in the book of Genesis that we see drunkenness, what it was called. The daughters of Lot realized the new, the extent of what alcohol would do a cause. And they said that they would get their father drunk when they thought they were the last beings on earth and that they would have to reproduce and get their father to reproduce. They both decided each night to get him drunk to cause him to over drink. And like I said, drunkenness causes a lot of errors and that's the reason a lot of marriages has been dissolved or whatever. someone all year does good or whatever but at the Christmas party they have a little bit too much or whatever and they drink and get satiated with alcohol or whatever and comes about adultery or fornication or some other idea something happens or whatever so drunkenness has a long line of what happens to people or whatever and I told you spiritual drunkenness I was talking about that last time I think The book of Leviticus, the 10th chapter, the ninth through the 10th verse says, now the Lord instructed Aaron, never drink wine or strong drink when you go into the tabernacle, lest you die. This rule applies to your sons and to all your descendants from generation to generation. Your duties will be to arbitrate for the people, to teach them the difference between what is holy and what is ordinary, what is pure and what is impure. So we see there that if you're drinking, that's the living Bible's version of when it says what is pure and what is impure. And the reason I read that because that's what holiness is about, pure and impure in keeping the sacred, sacred, and not profaning that which is sacred. The Amplified in King James reads differently, it says, this shall be a permanent statute throughout your generations to make a distinction and recognize a difference between the holy, that which is sacred, and the common, that which is profane. to be and between the ceremonially unclean and the clean. And when we say ceremonially, that's why I didn't read that at first because we'll see that the ceremonial aspects of the law, that's the ordinances that was nailed to the cross. It wasn't the law that was nailed, it was the ceremony of the rituals. Those laws of clean and unclean, that's why I say it reads in the living, the pure and impure, because the precept is there, and that's what the people was mocking Isaiah about precept upon precept and line upon line. When the prophets and the teachers and the priests put it away about drinking or whatever, they was talking about the precept of being under alcohol, imbibing in alcohol and being separated and sacred from the profane. But it's the ability to find out what is pure and impure and be rational, be not inhibited by anything. That's what happened with Aaron's sons, that they were drunk in this. They were drunk and profane. And when they was drinking, it caused them to offer up profane fire. In other words, the wrong fire. They offered up strange fire to the Lord. And that's when he struck them dead. because you can't make proper decisions while you're under the influence of something else, you're intoxicated or inhibited. We don't want to rattle off the number of statistics of how many families have been killed by drunken drivers, how much damage the drunken driver has did throughout the ages and over time of the killings on the highway and different things going on or whatever. Drunkenness, the depth of being drunken, growing up with the children, I showed you where he said that the parents would stone the children to death or whatever. The young men that killed the two young men the other day and the baby, that was at the swimming pool or whatever, just think it might have been better if their parents might have killed them before they were able to get under influence to do someone else this much harm, to cause this harm to others. What if we had acted upon God's laws and did what God had told us? There were plenty of witnesses around, but a lot of them were afraid to come forward because of what happened to witnesses. And because of the way our system is, much wouldn't be done about it. And it's multiple people out there that have committed multiple murders and everything. And they are not afraid to kill or whatever, because we've gotten so far away from God's law that people kill and shoot in broad daylight, knowing the ramifications, or they might still be out a couple of weeks from now, or they get off with killing one or two people. Whereas we've removed the death penalty and capital punishment or whatever, and that causes a problem, because the word of God says, If you take man's life, man shall take your life. That's the job of the government, to take one's life, who take others' lives. The wine of Babylon's fornication, that's what I went into last time in the book of Revelations, talking about wine of Babylon's fornication. God describes the world as being drunk with the wine of Babylon's fornication. That comes from some of my earlier teachings when he told Jeremiah that he was going to pass the cup around to the world and all of the world was going to drink of the cup. Drinking of the cup meaning that they was going to take part in whatever that cup they were drinking out of, whether it was the Lord's cup or whether it was the devil's cup, and you can't drink from both cups. So drinking from the devil's cup or drinking from the wrong cup would be religious apostasy. It would be drinking doctrinal errors, and that's where we get drunk from, the seducing spirits, the fallen spirits, the leaven, the doctrine that contains leaven or whatever. So it's the doctrine, the teaching that's making the people drunk. It's the false teaching or whatever. It's of another spirit that's not the spirit of God. They are people who are in no condition to serve God because they cannot drink, cannot think straight spiritually. They think they're in control when they are not, so they cannot be holy. They attempt to serve him in immorality and unethically. And we see people doing that all the time because they're not teaching holiness. You remember I said, it's be ye holy, and it's pure impure. And we've kind of diluted holiness, and that's what's been happening. That's why it's under a bad influence. Perhaps all of the other biblical references to drunkenness are nothing more than bare references to this occasion of the wine of the fornication of Babylon, of that great harlot of Babylon, where I read to you Sunday, the 17th chapter of Revelations in the fourth verse, about the whole world was drunken from that wine from the harlot. And if someone's under the influence of alcohol cannot serve God properly, neither can someone that's under the influence of wrong doctrine, or wrong belief system, or wrong teaching. And I tell you, under the influence, about the influence of the world, and that's what has influenced the world. I mean the church, the world has influenced the world, I mean the church, And they are in a Laodicean state. They're neither hot nor cold. And Hosea says, in the fourth chapter, Hosea, the 11th through the 12th verse, says, whoredom and wine and new wine take away the heart. My people ask counsel at their stocks and their staffs declaring to them, for the spirit of whoredoms have caused them to err, and they have gone a-whoring from under their gods. In the Amplified Version, that reads, prostitution, wine, and new wine take away the mind and the spiritual understanding. That's why I say this is spiritual. This wine that he's talking about is doctrine. It's false doctrine. It's a different spirit. It's a different Christ. It's not the true Jesus. They're drinking of the cup of the devil, of that doctrine, of that teaching. That's why it says, and the spiritual understanding of the people. My people consult their lifeless wooden idols, and the divinest ones give them oracles. For spirit of prostitution have led them astray, and morally and spiritually, and they have played the prostitute, withdrawing themselves from God. The preachers are teaching for money. Money, that's what the whole world is about today, just about is money. Money cometh. It's about prosperity. Who has the most? How much someone's getting paid? You'll sell yourself, you'll sell your congregation, you'll sell anything. It's about the dollar. It's become about money, and it's a spirit of prostitution. You've prostituted yourself and it has put you in a drunken stupor for the things that you hear. In the book of Proverbs, that's what I'm trying to find out. I'm building my sermon for this week here that I may do two different sermons on it. Because if you notice the prostitute is what in the book of Proverbs Her speaking and her teaching gets this wayward young man Causes his death causes the trap and we see the harlot the mother harlot In the book of Revelations, that great Babylonian harlot is what gets the people off track. And we call America, this nation, Babylon because it's a capitalistic nation. This nation needs all other nations materially and wealth and monetary things. so in America just about with with money you can do just about everything and that's the Cause of the problems is money and it's in spirituality. That's what the preachers are drunk in it that's why it says all that the tables are unclean or whatever because it cut it takes money to have cathedrals and mega churches and television audiences and and Cadillacs and mansions and yachts and jets and all these different things and that's what the people are focused on But it's nothing but drunkenness. It's spiritual drunkenness is Laodiceanism the book of revelations the 17th chapter and there came one of the of the seven angels, which had the seven vows, and talked with me, saying unto me, Come hither, I will show unto thee the judgment of the great whore that sitteth upon many waters, with whom the kings of the earth have committed fornication, and inhabitants of the earth have been made drunk with the wine of her fornication." You notice it says that the whole world had been made drunk with the wine of her fornication. So we see in the way christianity has been taught in the missionaries and things that go out that we're talking of a religious spirit here a spirit of apostasy that has closed the people's eyes because let's keep on reading it says so he carried me away in the spirit into the wilderness and i saw a woman sit up on a scarlet colored beast full of names of blasphemy having seven heads and ten horns And the woman was arrayed in purple and scarlet color and decked with gold and precious stones and pearls, having a golden cup in her hand full of abominations and filthiness of her fornication. There we go again with that filthiness and abominations in her hand and on the tables and spread out or whatever. These abominations of this vomit, of this poison that comes out. We notice that in Revelation it says the poison of Asp are under their tongues or whatever. It's the words they're speaking are poison. This is the bite. This is the doctrine that leads laden houses of silly women laden with sin that leads people away like the pied piper. That's how you charm someone is with words, great swelling words, testimonies, and speech. That's how you enchant someone with different concoctions and words. And it says, up on her forehead was a name written. Mystery Babylon the great mother of harvest and Abomination of the earth and I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the Saints and with the blood of the Mars so not only was she drunken with false doctrine or whatever and with Creating a saying these things but she had went so far as the church and went so far as to kill some of the Saints of God to persecute the Saints of God to torture the saints of God. It says they were drunken with the blood of the martyrs. You remember I was saying about Whitman, who lost his job over the truth, and a lot of people that stand for him and tell the truth. You'll lose your job, you'll lose your life during this time for telling the truth, for standing in the truth. The same thing happened with the people during that time, the same thing that's happening at this time. Also, we want to look at the church in chapter 3 and verse 14 at Laodicea. It says, Unto the angel of the church at Laodicea is right. These things say of the amen, the faithful and the true witness, the beginning of the creation of God. I know thine works, and that thou art neither cold nor hot. I would thou were cold or hot, so then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spill thee out of my mouth, because thou sayest, I am rich, I am increased with goods, and have needed nothing. And knowest not, now this is a wealthy person, you see they have money, they have riches, they have all material that they think they could have, but what Christ says, it says, but knowest not that thou art wretched, miserable, and poor and blind and naked, only a drunk person would be in that condition or that state to think that they were one way and they were completely 100% another way. Only a drunken person would think that they were rich and had need of nothing when they was in poverty and actually naked and had need of eyesight that they could see. he says that they had they says accounts of the to buy from me gold tried in in the far that that may as be rich and white raiment that that may as be clothed in the shame of that nakedness do not appear in a north and i was outside that that might and see so we see the world the lay of the season in the church is what's Their spirit's been taken away by capitalism, by money, by status, by position or whatever, and they're drunk with this spirit. That's what has intoxicated them. That's what the world has followed off. The whole world has been deceived in that they have been influenced and drunken by this. Undoubtedly, the Israelites in Hosea's day was literally getting drunk and involved in hallucination. But for us today, the application is spiritual. You remember, it's not that we, like I say, more through knowledge and intellectualism, a lot of us are not dying from alcohol poisoning. There's a lot of them are dying from alcohol and drunkenness. But chief at this end time, we see it that the church is the main problem. The main problem is a spiritual apostasy of the church, the church falling away from Christ, allowing things that the church never would, living ways unrespectable that never was for the church, never was a part of the church. At the end time, God predicts his people will be deceived by a force near demonical in its deceptive power. That's the great Leviathan. You remember I told you, Leviathan has to be loosed. And the only way that we can see these deceptive and deceitful powers that had blinded us, and the God of this world has blinded us with the things of this world, and we've become lethargic to them, that God has to loosen us with the Word of God. That's the only thing that we can receive, powers through His Spirit and through the Word of God to loosen the bonds of Satan. And to walk in the truth is what loosens Satan's hold upon us. Because of their closeness to the world, they will share the great harlot's attitude, drunk with the wine of her fornication. They're going to have that attitude and that disposition because they cannot see. They're blinded. And that's the world we live in. That's the world we see our children in. We can see that the true Christians that that reserved part of his can see this battle ensuing in this fight being lost at such a great stage, but that God's not losing people, but that God's purpose is coming about and we're looking for the manifestations of the true sons of God. That's what we're cheering on and hoping for is the manifestations of God's children. Hosea's word picture illustrates the effect of a drug like alcohol that have on a person's mind. Under the influence of alcohol, one's reaction is slow, even though the person thinks he has better control. And that's what we're not reacting as quick as we should. It's taking us too long to recoil. We shouldn't allow these things to unravel. We should be able to make a determination right then and there. See, the problem is we're not quick of understanding. That's because we're not spiritually strong. and what inhibits your reactions is alcohol. So if a wrong spirit, in other words, wrong teachings, inhibits you because you think this is right. You've been taught a lot of times you get into one church and you get into different churches, now you're confused about what doctrine is right or not, and you have to make up your mind. You have to go back and read and study and pray up or whatever, whereas We have to be Johnny on the spot. We have to be ready at all times. We have to be ready at all seasons. We can't keep slipping. God's looking for prepared people, a person that's not drunk. That's why he says be sober and be vigilant. whereas Peter, he went to sleep in the garden. You remember he says, the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. We have to stave off this slothfulness that drunkenness comes about. Remember I told you in the Song of Solomon that the bride, she was sleeping, she was sluggish, and she didn't know that the bridegroom had came. because she was lethargic. She wasn't in a right mind. She wasn't thinking straight. And that's what the Word of God does. It gives us right thinking. It calls us to be ready. And you want to be ready. It tells us to be ready and stop being lethargic. Stop being behind. He wants you to be an overcomer and not overcome. I was telling you about most of the failed accidents in the United States involves automobiles and Roughly half of them occur when one is under the influence of drinking or whatever. So there are a lot of problems in the church today. And the problem is the pastors are leading the church astray. So many mega pastors have so many people in the church. But what happens if the blind is leading the blind? How many people is falling in the ditches? just a little flock, the little people of God is trying to sustain the purity of the Christian religion whereas the mega-churches are polluting this wholesalely and everybody thinks this is right it's hard to fight against Christmas and Easter and all that when the false prophets are teaching this is right this is the true way it's hard to fight against different things that these Trojan horses, they're brought into the churches. Because to win your children, we must learn to entertain you. Church has to have entertainment. You have to be able to feed the people like that's what they wanted Jesus to do, continually feed the children. You have to have a program for the children. You have to have music ministries and everything. The church has to cater to the people, and that's what they advertise now. Give the people what they want. It's not what God thinks they need. It's not the people's needs they're searching for. You have to make the people happy. You have to have a user-friendly church. You have to allow the people to dress any kind of way. Have casual Sunday, have casual Friday, have casual times or whatever. Whereas God told the people that you be dressed and you be prepared, put on your best to come before me. That was during the time of Moses. But we see people just coming to church any kind of way now. We can't just come before God and treat God casually and call him dude and the man upstairs and all these other things. We've lost our reference because that's how a drunken person begins to reason and to think. He starts profaning that which is holy. In driving while intoxicated, one's ability to make right decisions is severely hampered. And the thing about it, we've ordained preachers and people too quickly. They do online ministries now to ordain ministers, and everybody's a preacher, everybody's a doctor, and they call them doctors now, and bishops, and apostles, and all these names. But the problem is, we've diluted what the doctrine of Christ. They've taken the sharp edge off of it. They've taken away the respect for that which is holy. We've taken away the reverence away from God. They don't reverence His people. They don't reverence the church. And we see them joking about it all on television. Even the preachers and the people are joking about these things. You got some preachers say that God sent them to be a clown minister, or God sent them to be a joker, and that's what they do is tell jokes all the time. They're a jokester or whatever. And the Bible tells us about foolish talking and ingesting and a lot of joking or whatever. Linked to this inability to make sound judgment is the destructions of inhibitions, modesty, and restraint. That's going away from the church. The women are no longer dressing with modesty. They are no longer have shame faced it and show bright. They wearing anything at any length and exposing themselves or whatever. This is what intoxicated person does. He doesn't, they aren't aware of what they're doing when they cause lasciviousness. when they cause others to lust after them. They cause these lusting spirits or whatever. So that's why we have so much divorce and thing at all these levels. In addition, alcohol produces a false sense of security and confidence. So people do silly and senseless things while drunk and regret them along with their hangovers. Well, there's a lot of spiritual teaching and preaching nowadays which allows people to do everything and say God will forgive you for anything and God will forgive you everything. And people nowadays. They sin because that grace will abound. And Paul says, shall we sin that grace will abound? God forbid. So you find out that Christians are some of the most violent people because they figure that they could do anything and repent of it or change. As long as I apologize, I repent. I say I'm sorry. Sometimes sorry doesn't shine the shoes. Sometimes sorry you says if a person's forgive ask for forgiveness and all that But is it a true forgiveness? Is it a true repentance? You remember how many times Saul repented and told David he was sorry and and he changed and he wasn't going to do this. It wasn't the heart. It wasn't from the heart. Judas repented of himself after he had betrayed Christ or whatever, but the repentance was because he felt something was going to happen to him. He endangered his life. He knew what he had done. It wasn't because he was sorry for betraying Christ. It wasn't because he truly wanted to serve Christ. And that's the same thing with people. A lot of people are sorry or regretful. It's because things have not come out for their well-being because they fear what's about to happen to them. So it's not out of reverence to God or wanting to serve God or loving God. It's like trying to save your life because you're about to die. this is a last minute thing or whatever. It's not recognizing your errors, it's recognizing you were wrong. It's no true repentance and that's what you're not getting out of the drunken churches to spirits. It's not a spirit that teaches repentance because repentance is what brings you to conviction. It brings you to sobriety. Now you realize what you have done and the penitence before God and that you repent of your sins and you turning to be a better person. But not in the drunken stupor and you operating in darkness. The same process occurs to a person drunk with the wine of the wrath of this spiritual prostitute. The attitude of this world deprives people of their spiritual judgment and removes their spiritual inhibitions. And that's what I say. You have Christians acting and saying in ways, this is not the proper fruit. This is not the proper appearance of a child of God. This is something God's people wouldn't be caught doing. It's the wrong attitude. We're high-minded. It's a hearty spirit. That's what Ephraim had. They stood back and watch the calamity that befell their brothers or whatever. So it wasn't a true love for mankind and a caring for those around you. It wasn't empathizing. They didn't get the love of God in their heart, and that's what's wrong with the spiritual drunks of today and what it does. It sears your conscience. The preaching and teaching today sears, S-E-A-R-S, sears your conscience. Their resistance to evil weakens, and they will begin to do things that they vowed they would never do. Like a drunken man's fidelity to his wife is destroyed by wine, so is a Christian's loyalty to God when he imbibes of this world's attitudes. His judgment is shattered. He becomes hardened. He becomes like Judas. You sell the Savior for 30 pieces of silver. you start losing your moral value. That's what they were saying about the senator from Louisiana here, John Kennedy and Scalise or whatever. They have become morally corrupted behind this last president we have. We see our politicians and our spiritual leaders now are morally and ethically drunk. because they're saying what's on their mind. This last president started having them. He was a drunkard in the spiritual sense, because he didn't even drink alcohol or whatever. But the words that he said wasn't sound doctrine. They wasn't spiritual words. So the power of life and death is in words, and it caused division in the nation. It caused hatred in the nation. It caused a separation and not a union of the people. We see the results, and continuing to see the results, there's no unity, but it brought forth division and chaos. A major key to understanding the application of both Hosea and Amos to us is that both prophets prophesied in Israel. The 10 northern tribes in an era similar to that in which we live, that is, in a last generation before a major national calamity. That's where we are at now. They went to the northern tribes in Amos and Hosea. Amos, he was just a fig farmer or whatever. He was a farmer of figs, sycamore trees and things or whatever. Hosea and all of those spoke to the drunken people in the north, but the national calamity was Assyria was going to come and take them. They was going to lose their identity. They was going to be lost and become the lost tribes of Israel. The nation is facing national calamity. There's a national calamity on the horizon. And we see where the United States Capitol was violated and the people thought this to be good, that this was fantastic and they hadn't repented of these things. In their case, it was just before the people of Israel were carried away. In our case, we don't know what's gonna be the case here, but we know that it's gonna cause a division and this healing is only gonna come about as Christ comes in and brings his healing and brings the destruction, brings in his people. The holiness of Christ brings in the end times, that we're at that point or whatever that Christ is coming in. And that's the only thing that's gonna stabilize this nation and all the rest of the nation. that they become the nations of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I think we were living in that era where we've seen the last of this nation as a powerhouse, as a power nation. That from this point on in, we'll start seeing the sons of God manifest themselves and things happen as though it never happened before. Historical records and archaeological records findings show that Israel was quite prosperous at the time, a major world power. Simultaneously, the nation was morally rotten to the core, and social injustice was the order of the day throughout the land. That's what you see today, social injustice. The people are crying and their children are being shot down in the streets. The police are some of the ones doing the shooting and it's your neighbors, it's your relatives and things killing one another. There's nothing but rottenness in our legislatures and they're fighting and no political honor among these people. They can't even get along with one another. So we have rottenness to the core. All of the governmental programs are corrupt. They've been infiltrated by corrupt religious people. The religious people who have gotten in positions, as I was telling you, they come in with sheep's clothing on, but really they're arriving as wolves looking out only for their material selves, only their god is their belly. Yet a far more spiritual drunkenness guided their conduct. In addition, they practiced the ritual of pagan religions they had adopted. And that's what's happened to this nation. They're preaching another Jesus. There's another Jesus. There's a much more violent Jesus that they adopted in the preaching. There's a Jesus that doesn't care about the poor. There's a Jesus that doesn't care about the elderly, the oppressed. That's the Jesus that this nation has adopted. Their religious teaching is preaching, and you can feel this. Those that are children of God realize that there is a battle that's going on, not on the horizon, but we're in the midst of a battle, and everything is coming aloose. The lesson for us spiritual, God is saying that the end time it will be as if a demonic power has seized the nation, destroying largely to God in a spiritual drunken frizzy, during which the people would think themselves totally in control, but since they're spiritually drunk, they're operating in darkness. And that's why it says darkness will come up on the earth, a famine of hearing God's Even as drugs destroy a person's capacity to think clearly and break down resistance to evil and sober cloud the mind that he becomes morally stupid, so does the spiritual drunkenness that results from a person allowing himself to drink of the world's ways. So we see what's been happening. I've seen this in the last four years, what happens when we have a Nero in. When we have political vice, we have St. Augustine, we have religion trying to run the nation. The problem is that there are different aspects of religion. It's drunken religion, vomit on the table. There's no soundness in them. This is pure madness. And then God's the only one can separate this darkness. He's the only one can shine light. So escape into the fantasies of this world's attitudes and conduct. deprives a person of his understanding. You go get into some video games, Crush Candy, some, what it is, Playstations and sports and all of these other things, and try to take your mind off reality. Go to the movie or entertainment or something, try not to think about what's going on in the world. You can't be removed from it, and that's what makes you drunk. It's the computers that's making you drunk. It's the entertainment. It's the sports. It's the world being entertained by the world because nothing can satisfy this or sober you up but the Word of God. That's what sobers you and makes you vigilant. That's what gives you a moral compass. That's the only thing that can keep you straight. But everything else removes inhibition and inspires false confidence, even bravado. It plays havoc with modesty and restraint and destroys loyalty within relationships. And we see where these people are not loyal to one another. It's step on each other, get as far as you can go. It's dog eat dog. We see what's happening religiously. If you're religion, if you're not seeing this, you're not sons of God and you're drunk. These things are happening, but you're blinded. You're led to sin. Your religion has become dull. Your hearing has become dull. And he told Isaiah that was going to happen to preachers that he was preaching to. They was going to become dull of hearing. They wasn't going to be able to see. They wasn't going to be able to understand. What's going on? If a person's blind, he can't see. If he can't hear, And he can't understand. He must be drunk. Right? He was preaching to a drunken people. It wasn't a physical drinking so much, but they didn't have the ability because it's the spirit. The fear of God is the beginning of wisdom, knowledge, and understanding. And they lacked that. They lacked God. They lacked the spirit of God within them. He's the light. If you don't have him, you have no light. You can't see where you're going. You can't love people. No wonder the churches don't love one another because Christ is outside of the church knocking on the door, asking to be let into the church. How can you love your fellow man if Christ is outside of your heart? The false teachers and their doctrines have adulterated the church. In other words, their infiltration of the church has brought about an impurity into the church. It's brought about fornication into the church that now you've committed a breach, a spiritual breach that has taken away It's like getting drunk. In other words, it's drinking of the wine of a foreign country. In other words, it's spiritual drunkenness. It's not a liquor, but it's of the mind, of the understanding. Absolute purity is replaced by whatever is taught by your church. Each church has their different teachings and whatever is right. It's like during the time of judges, each man was writing his own eyesight. A man's wage was writing his own eyesight. I think we're not gonna go any further tonight. But you have to see that we're talking spiritual here, spiritual drunkness. And there are many people that you need to beware of wherever you go that are spiritually drunk and they will never get this. It's not possible because they are the cursed. They are the lost. Heavenly Father,