Good morning, everyone. Again, it's an honor and a privilege to bring you God's Word on today's beautiful Sabbath day. And as always, we're going to go line by line in Scripture, and we're up to Hebrews chapter 7, as you can see today in the background, and we're going to be discussing the most dangerous man on the planet, and that is Melchizedek, who's mentioned in depth in this part of Scripture. And we're going to see the difference between a man of God whom the reprobate feared, someone who kept the covenant, was deadly serious about the covenant, and what we've gone through at times not only in the Old Testament, but in the New Testament, and now in the latter days of church history, where the elders in the church are not feared anymore. They're more concerned with being friendly with the culture, being someone's buddy, fitting into the times at hand. And the problem is when you're in the midst of a wicked generation, you cannot be their friend. You cannot syncretize with them as we're going to discuss today. We're going to see the difference between someone like Amal Chizadek, who the reprobate feared, and what we have today in modern evangelicalism, especially it's only taken a further downturn in the year 2023, we don't have many serious men of God. And they don't challenge those around them, they don't challenge those they preach to and bring the word to, and they don't challenge those out in the world. And by an elder, I don't just mean someone who preaches in a church or someone who godfully, faithfully brings about a faithful ruling in a church as an elder, but elders in general, 60, 70, 80 year olds, you're very important and you need to keep the fire alive when it comes to God and bringing his word and giving witness to those around you. And all because you're not honored in the world's eyes because of the way the culture is now where we don't have We don't put value in our elders, and we're suffering for it. You need to stay faithful, and you need to challenge those around you. So we're going to see why Melchizedek was so feared, and we could see that from corollary evidence in Scripture, in the Word, and we're going to see how even in the New Testament, elders were feared. They loved the people, and many times often the people loved them, but they brought a serious message from the Word of God, deadly serious, where your life and your eternal life depended on it. So there was no lack of respect for the Word, and there was no bowing down before the people because they didn't like what you were saying. So let's pray, and then we'll get into our text. And again, the text we're going to be reading today We're up to Hebrews chapter 7 and we'll be working on verses 1 through 10. So let's pray and then we'll read our scripture and I'll make the face only a mother could love smaller and we'll look at the word and see if what I'm saying today is correct if Melchizedek was. the most dangerous man on the planet. And I'll show you that at the time he lived, he was, he was the most dangerous to the flesh, the devil and the world because he was holding on to God's covenant until it was going to be transferred to Abraham. And he was a faithful servant of the Lord. So let's pray and then we'll get into this, this part of scripture. Almighty God, the great and living God, we thank you, Lord, for your faithfulness to us, how you keep your covenant, how you never break your oath, Lord. And we thank you for sending your Son to redeem us. I pray, Lord, that today I would bring a faithful message, regardless of the opinions of men, that it would please you. and that some might be saved, that some might be rejuvenated in their faith from hearing this word. So I pray this prayer as Lord is a sinful man wanting to serve you. And I pray that you would make my speech pure, that I would honor you with my lips today and the words that I would speak. And more importantly, Lord, as we know that your word does not go out and then return void, we pray Lord it would touch those who it's meant to touch. And we thank you, Lord. In the name of your Son, our only King, Jesus Christ. Amen. Okay. So let's get into our scripture. Today is a very serious word from God. We're going to see how deadly serious Melchizedek was and what that meant. So let's get into our scripture today. We're going to be reading from Hebrews chapter seven, verses one through 10. And then of course, we'll break it down. So let me shrink me down to size. And that's how small I am compared to God's word in reality, even smaller. So let's read this together. So we are in Hebrews chapter seven, and we're going to read about this man of mystery, Melchizedek. So we're going to be in verses 1 through 10. So let's read together. For this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, who met Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings. Amazing, right? And blessed him. to whom also Abraham gave a tenth part of all, first being by interpretation king of righteousness, and after that also king of Salem, which is king of peace. And we'll get into his name, and we'll explain all this. Without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like unto the Son of God, abideth the priest continually. Now consider how great this man was unto whom even the patriarch Abraham gave the tenth of the spoils. And verily they that are of the sons of Levi, who received the office of the priesthood, have a commandment to take tithes of the people according to the law, that is, of their brethren, though they come out of the loins of Abraham. But he whose descent is not counted from them received tithes of Abraham, and blessed him that had the promises. And without all contradiction the less is blessed of the better. And he and men that die receiveth tithes, but there he receiveth them, of whom it is witnessed that he liveth. And as I may so say, Levi also, who receiveth tithes, paid tithes in Abraham, for he was yet in the loins of his father, while Melchizedek met him. Wonderful passage, very interesting, a lot to explain and understand, but we're going to see why Melchizedek was the baddest man on the planet. And in the popular culture, we talk about dangerous men, maybe professional fighters, and you have this expression, the baddest man on the planet, the man that Other fighters fear the one that is to be feared, a very dangerous man. Well, even more so than some cheap comparison when it comes to the fighting world. In the spiritual world, in the present, at that time, was the most feared man. And he was feared by the wicked, and we'll see why. So, Melchizedek. From this, Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, amid Abraham returning from the slaughter of the kings, and blessed him, to whom also Abraham gave a tenth of all, first being by interpretation king of righteousness, and after that also king of Salem, which is king of peace." So the first thing we want to discuss, Melchizedek, king of Salem, was the most dangerous man on the planet. In the eyes of the wicked, And we'll see why. He ruled ancient Jerusalem and was nestled between Sodom and Gomorrah and the Canaanites, and no one messed with him. He was so respected and feared, Abraham paid them tithes as a representative of God's covenant. He was a successful king representing God in the middle of vicious, perverted, and murderous pagans. And what a message for us today, right? He was a successful king. Abraham and Lot were both victimized in this lawless landscape. Who is Melchizedek that he was left unmolested? May Christian elders once again be feared in a wicked generation instead of syncretizing with the wicked. So we see this Melchizedek, this king of righteousness, this man whom the pagans around him feared and for good reason, was someone not to play around with. And we see that even Abraham, and this part of scripture has lost the seriousness of it. Abraham went to rescue his nephew and slaughtered pagans. And in self-preservation, when it's a righteous cause, we are allowed as believers to fight unbelievers, not to necessarily conquer land or be offensive, but to be defensive. And we ought to be feared because, again, the message we bring is deadly serious. So this Melchizedek, who I said is why people admire superheroes and great men, I think he's underappreciated. This is a bad, bad man. And by that, we mean a dangerous man. And he was dangerous in that he brought an uncompromising message. And while the world was completely lost, remember, this is after the flood. So God flooded the world, but then he promised that he would not flood the world again. So how does God restart without having to destroy the world again through a flood? And he does this with a single line. And he calls out, Abraham, and he is now a Hebrew, and through his line, God would work, and he would sustain Abraham's line. And we see that the covenant was transferred from this mysterious Melchizedek, who could have been a Theophany, he could have been a Christophany, he could have been a Christ himself, but more importantly is the comparison that's made, that he was Christ-like in the way he was a priest. And that's what's being offered to us here. And for us to understand what's being said, we need to look at other scriptures. So the first scripture we're going to look at is Zechariah chapter two, verse 10. This Melchizedek was a messianic type. And in Zechariah, in this chapter that's accepted by everyone as messianic, both Jew and Gentile, we see in verse chapter 10, we're told, Sing and rejoice, O daughter of Zion, for lo, I come, and I will dwell in the midst of thee, saith the Lord. So a messianic figure was going to appear. And we see this in Hebrews, that when it's spoken of concerning Melchizedek, that he is a Christ type. and that he is a king of peace. And this is the title that he was given. The Messiah is given the title of king of peace because he brings peace. And we see that this is something that is very important when it comes to bringing peace. the Word of God, and we need to express to people how serious the Word of God is, how it saves souls. Now, I have a question, and you should have a question, as I mentioned before in our first point that we tried to make. Who is this man? that he's left unmolested. We see that Abraham is victimized, his nephew was taken. We see that Lot is victimized, and Sodom and Gomorrah, what he's about to go through later on, where two angels go there to rescue him, and the men in the city are ready to gang rape the angels, sodomized both of them. So what was it about this Melchizedek? Well, again, very serious man. Obviously, he didn't have the weaknesses that Abraham had or that Lot had. And we see that He was able to come out without fear. He greeted Abraham after Abraham slaughtered some of the kings, some of the kings in Canaan, the Canaanites, and he was able to step out. without fear and greet Abraham. And that's why in the Jewish tradition, and some Christians believe this might have even been Shem, because who would be feared like this, except a true crusader for the Lord that would hold on to the true faith. But he doesn't have to be Shem. And again, as I mentioned last week, that's extra biblical. But this was a serious man. And that's why it's such a shame when we don't have serious preaching or serious Christians. And we've made the Christian church, since the 1950s in this country, an upper-middle-class social club where people, they don't take the Word of God seriously anymore. And we see the continued degeneration. And even Christians with the way they spoil their children, some of them don't even make their children go to church, it's a choice of the children. But when they do attend church, they're allowed to dress like slobs. Some of the women attend church, we've had prostitutes come to our church that knew better, that when they came to the church to hear the word of God, they were dressed properly. And you look at some of the women, the way they attend church, they attend church like they're prostitutes. And the men walk in sometimes dirtier than they would be at home. And there is no Sunday best anymore. And the poorest of people, even slaves in this country, when they would attend church, would wear their best. They wanted to represent themselves in the best way they could, and more importantly, to appear before God the way they could. So the inside of a church did not look like a Walmart today, with people walking around half naked or in pajamas. But that's the type of respect we have for God, because the men of God aren't serious anymore with the message. They don't present a serious, a deadly serious God to the people, the God of the covenant. and whom we need to fear and revere. We now have the God that's our buddy. He has tattoos and piercings like we do and wears pajamas in heaven. So what a horrible disgrace, and we see why the culture at large doesn't take us seriously. But Melchizedek, even the Canaanites, even Sodom and Gomorrah, they took him seriously. They left him alone, and we see this in the Word. because two other men that did not take God seriously enough at times, Abraham and especially Lot, remember when Lot was given a choice what place to inhabit, he chose New York City for him and his family. We could make money there, it'd be more profitable, it was exciting. But we see in the story of Lot that even when he left New York, New York stayed with his family and affected them deeply. And not picking on New York, I mean that's any major city today, look at what's going on there. So this is not how we are supposed to behave. And Melchizedek demanded respect in the person that he was. So we see in verse 1, for this Melchizedek, king of Salem, priest of the Most High God, who met Abraham, returning from the slaughter, of the kings and blessed him, to whom also Abraham gave a tenth part of all, first being by interpretation king of righteousness, and after that also king of Salem, which is king of peace. And we see this in the next part of Scripture, that we forget about the covenant, how serious it is, that why elders are so important, why Jesus Christ himself was so focused on training apostles that would be faithful to him and why they needed to be faithful in transferring the covenant. It's something that God has ordained for us to do. We've been given the keys to the kingdom of heaven. And this was not given to a Catholic pope, but this was given to the elders of the church that through God's law, by his principles, which is also part of the gospel, we could explain to people what was acceptable to God and what wasn't acceptable. That through using the word of God, some people, by rejecting the gospel, by the right parameters, would be shut out of the kingdom and others would be brought in. And I want to show you an example how serious this is from Genesis chapter 48. that those outside the covenant had to be brought in by an elder or acknowledged by an elder. And this is what Melchizedek was doing. It was showing that the covenant that God made with Abraham was legitimate and now God's main representative, the priest king on earth, the only one on the entire planet would honor Abraham and bless him. And Abraham would honor this king of peace, this king of righteousness, even his name, Malki Zedek, Malchizedek. Where we get the word Malcolm from, it means king, and Zedek means righteousness. So this king of righteousness that would acknowledge Abraham and bless him and transfer the covenant fully to Abraham on this planet. Now do we have the right to do that? Does God do this within his people group? You bet he does. And we're going to turn to chapter 48 and we're going to read verses 1 through 12. We're going to see that even in the case of Joseph, remember, We have Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Jacob had sons. One of his sons was Joseph. For my Bible scholars who know their Bible, Joseph was in Egypt. He actually had children with a woman who technically was outside the covenant. She was an Egyptian. And they had to be brought into the covenant. And how were they brought in? Through a blessing from the elder, from the superior, from his father Jacob. And we're going to see that these children that Joseph had that may have been seen as illegitimate, Jacob adopted them so they would be brought into the covenant because Joseph having these children with an Egyptian woman and having them outside of the land of Israel and outside of the family line, that was a problem. So we're going to see Jacob brings them in very much the way Melchizedek is acknowledging Abraham and showing him that he's in the covenant and blessing him and bringing him in fully that he would be the inheritor of the covenant. We see that Joseph has to have this done by his father Jacob. So let's read the story together so you could see that I'm not lying and I'm faithfully preaching and teaching the Word of God. So again, let me focus on Scripture and shrink myself down and let's look at this together. It should be highlighted in yellow as we follow along. So we're told Genesis chapter 48 verses 1 to 12, one of the most beautiful stories in scripture, melts your heart, how things can work out to God's glory. Let's look at this. And it came to pass after these things that one told Joseph, behold, thy father is sick and he took with him his two sons Manasseh and Ephraim. And one told Jacob and said, Behold, thy son Joseph cometh unto thee, and Israel strengthened himself and sat upon the bed. And Jacob said unto Joseph, God Almighty appeared unto me at Luz in the land of Canaan, and blessed me, and said unto me, Behold, I will make thee fruitful, and multiply thee, and I will make of thee a multitude of people, and will give this land to thy seed after thee for an everlasting possession. And now thy two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, which were born unto thee in the land of Egypt before I came unto thee into Egypt, are mine, as Reuben and Simeon they shall be mine. And thy issue, which thou begettest after them, shall be thine, and they shall be called after the name of their brethren and their inheritance. And as for me, when I came from Padan, Rachel died by me, his beloved Rachel, in the land of Canaan in the way, when yet there was but a little way to come unto Ephrath. And I buried her there in the way of Ephrath, the same as Bethlehem, the house of bread. And Israel beheld Joseph's sons and said, Who are these? And Joseph said unto his father, They are my sons, whom God hath given me in this place. And he said, Bring them, I pray thee, unto me, and I will bless them. See, this blessing from the superior, the elder, to the lesser, or the younger in the covenant, those who need to be brought in, this is what we're seeing with Melchizedek and Abraham. Now the eyes of Israel were dim for age so that he could not see and he brought them near unto him and kissed them and embraced them. It's beautiful, beautiful, beautiful, beautiful story we have here. And Israel said unto Joseph, I had not thought to see thy face and lo, God has showed me also thy seed. A father's hope, a father's prayer. And Joseph brought them out from between his knees, and he bowed himself with his face to the earth. So even though it's his own father, We see Joseph knowing that his children need this blessing. They need to formally and officially be brought into the covenant by an elder. Joseph takes his small children, shows them to his father to be blessed, to be brought into the covenant line. And Joseph himself, even though it's his father, falls on his face. before Jacob. He's honoring the elder in the covenant. What a serious faith we used to have. What a joke we are today in the year 2023, or post-World War II, when we beat the fascists but we forgot to beat the communists. and now we have this humanistic egalitarianism where everyone's the same, and you go to church and your pastor, the show he relates to you is wearing clothes he would wear to work, or he's wearing shorts and slippers and a Hawaiian shirt, like that apostate jerk Rick Warren. I mean, this is the state of the church now. This is the state of the church. But how serious it was. And that's why many of us who are serious in the faith, we have a healthy fear of God. We think to ourselves, we have a different faith. It's like what J. Grisha Machen was saying in the 20s and 30s in his book, Christianity and Liberalism, as he was planting eventually the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. He was saying, look, The two groups use Christian terms, us and the liberals, but it's a different faith. And now we see that come true, how that was so prophetic, as you look at churches around you, and they proudly have a rainbow flag, the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and soon-to-be pedophile flag, and they're proud of it. And they have no fear. They have no fear of God. They have no idea what's going to befall them. But those who are serious about God's covenant and about the gospel and the gospel fulfilling God's covenant with man, we're serious about our faith. And Joseph was serious, and Melchizedek was serious. And again, these were dangerous men to the reprobate. And real preachers, real pastors, we are dangerous men in this wicked generation, because we have the words of life and death. And that's why they don't want to hear the gospel, because once they hear it, they're responsible for it. And that's why they censor us in real time on the street, and now on the internet, because When a pastor brings the word and he wears his black pulpit robe, he's wearing black as if it's a funeral if you don't accept those words. So I'm deadly serious with my children. They know who the God of the covenant is. The God of the covenant is not just their friend. It's the God who can give life and take life. And that's the God that needs to be encountered in the church again. So we see what a bad man In a good way, bad man, dangerous man, Melchizedek was. So as we continue in our verses in Hebrews, let's read the rest of them together. This Melchizedek, amazing. Amazing. And we'll explain further why. Without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, but made like unto the Son of God, abided the priest continually. Now consider how great this man was unto whom even the patriarch Abraham gave the tenth of the spoils. Again, the lesser giving to the greater. And verily, they that are the sons of Levi, who receive at the office of the priesthood, have a commandment to take tithes of the people according to the law that is of their brethren, though they come out of the loins of Abraham. But he whose descent is not counted from them received tithes of Abraham, and blessed him that had the promises. And without all contradiction the less is blessed of the better. And he and men that die receive tithes, but there he receiveth them of whom it is witnessed that he liveth. And as I may so say, Levi also who received tithes paid tithes in Abraham, for he was yet in the loins of his father when Melchizedek met him. You bet he was. So we see, as I forgot to shrink that down, forgive me, that it only gets better the explanation of the greatness of Melchizedek and how he was a type of Christ. So we see the apostle explains, the Lord gave this prophecy for our encouragement. Those who are children of Abraham, I'm sorry, I twisted my notes. The mysterious Melchizedek authorized by God to ensure covenant continuity. He was not a priest with limitations like the Levitical priests. He was uniquely authorized as a picture of Messiah to be king and priest forever. So here we see this exception. We see where he's different. He's not like regular priests. in that he couldn't retire. Remember, regular priests had a limitation, and that's why our next part of Scripture to look at is Numbers chapter 8. Sometimes we forget this. The priests did not serve continually. They had an expiration date. Literally, God gives it in Scripture. A priest had to be called sometime after the age of 25, and by age 50, he was retired. It's not like even what you see today in the New Testament. We have very faithful pastors. I had a pastor, he was a friend of mine, he was preaching until he was 88 years old. But that wasn't to be so in the Old Testament priestly system. You had an expiration date. Let me show that to you in Scripture. so we make sure we understand what's being said. So if you turn with me to Numbers chapter 28, we're going to look at this. And actually let me get this. I'm sorry, Numbers chapter eight. Let me get this for us. And we're in Numbers chapter 8. We're going to look at verses 24 through 26. And again, let me remember to shrink myself down so we can look at this together. Still getting used to this new system, so please be patient and forgive me. But as we look at this scripture, this is the part of scripture that we're referencing, Numbers chapter 8, verses 24 through 26 now remember we want to explain this we want you to understand the text so All priests were Levites, but not all Levites were priests. If you remember from the Old Testament, the Levites were the tribe. They were one of the tribes that, the only one that didn't have an inheritance of land, but tithes would be given to them to survive. And God, who is smarter than all of us, of course, understood you couldn't have a priestly line that also had land. So they couldn't have land and then tithes coming in from the other tribes. because it would be too tempting and it would give them too much power. So they had no land, but they had the tides coming in to serve. So all of Levi, you had to be a Levite to be a priest, but not all of Levi were priests. They had to be chosen. And then on top of that, not only was only a certain group, from the tribe of Levite to be priests, but even to be a kohanim or high priest. Some Jews today still have the surname Cohen that comes from the word kohanim. They're trying to claim that they came from a priesthood line, a line of those who were eligible to be high priest. You had to be of a certain age. So if you look at me, Verses 24 to 26 were told concerning these priests. This is it that belongeth unto the Levites. From twenty and five years old and upward they shall go in to wait upon the service of the tabernacle of the congregation. And from the age of fifty years they shall cease waiting upon the service thereof and shall serve no more. but shall minister with their brethren in the tabernacle of the congregation to keep the charge, and shall do no service. Thus shalt thou do unto the Levites, touching their charge. So this is the difference between them and Melchizedek in that They had an expiration date, Melchizedek didn't. So this is, again, what makes him so special. He didn't serve from age 25 to age 50. He was a priest forever. And that's why the Lord Jesus Christ is compared to him. He didn't need to be born of the tribe of Levi, obviously, because Levi wasn't born yet. He was in the loins of Abraham. This is covenantally speaking, physically speaking. And Melchizedek, being the greater, was a priest forever. And this is how in the book of Hebrews you can explain to those Jews who knew their scripture, well, wait a minute, we have priests. How can Jesus all of a sudden, Moshiach, Yeshua, be a priest? And he doesn't need to come from this line. And using Scripture the way we're supposed to today, using Scripture to explain ourselves, the author of Hebrews said, wait, this is not a lone example, the Messiah, Yeshua, Hamashiach, being this priest and king. We have this before. Look in Genesis. Our father Abraham had a greater than him before Melchizedek. And he was a priest of the Most High God and actually had more power, was more honored than a priest that retired at a certain age, like from the sons of Levi, from the sons of Aaron. Look, I'll show you. So this is how he justifies this Jesus absolutely could be the promised Messiah and the king priest hold this special office because we've had it before. We've read this before our whole lives about this great Melchizedek, this king of Shalom, Salem, this king of peace, this king of righteousness who ruled in the city of peace. And Jesus had this greater authority just like Melchizedek had. And again, we could use the scriptures to explain this. These are wonderful passages, but we have to look at them because if we don't look at them, we won't get the full meaning. And then we have this reference, what would Messiah do? Well, he'd do something like what was described in Isaiah chapter two. And again, let me shrink myself down so we can read Isaiah together. Isaiah chapter two, we have a picture of Messiah. We understand what the writer of Hebrews is talking about because we have it right here. And we see that when Messiah comes, there will be a time of peace. Men will have a rest that's different than what they had before. And what better rest than having a guarantee that your soul is saved as you accept the good news of the Messiah coming to earth and dying in your place and redeeming you. And we know that there are times in history, like when after Christ came, the Pax Romana, where as much as those Christians were persecuted early on, you had this time in history around 100 AD where, because of the Roman Empire and what was the known world, many of the wars ceased. You might have had some internal civil wars here and there, but This Roman peace, I mean, everywhere was conquered, and they established the roads and the sea routes that the apostle Paul could use to spread the gospel. So we see that God is moving in a different way from when Christ came. And it is unique, and it is messianic, and Isaiah describes this in chapter 2. The word that Isaiah the son of Amos saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem, and it shall come to pass in the last days that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established in the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills, and all nations shall flow unto it. Is there anyone today that doesn't know? of Israel and of the Holy Land. And many people should go and say, come ye and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord to the house of the God of Jacob. And he will teach us of his ways and we will walk in his paths for out of Zion shall go forth the law and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. So the nation of Israel which was destroyed by Rome by the son of Vespasian, Titus, in 69 AD. Now you have Christians of all denominations that want to go to the Holy Land to see it. And it's a prized place. By all three of the major faiths today, even though we know Christianity is the only true faith that God honors, still people go there. I mean, this prophecy in many ways has come true. And he shall judge among the nations, and shall rebuke many people, and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruninghooks. Nations shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more. O house of Jacob, come ye and let us walk in the light of the Lord. Therefore thou hast forsaken thy people, the house of Jacob. Now we see how serious God is because they be replenished from the East and are soothsayers like the Philistines and they please themselves in the children of strangers. So when I'm talking about the Holy Land, I mean where the temple was. I don't mean the newly established nation of Israel. I mean the geographical area. People do honor it. And we're also going to see later on, in this passage, that Messiah is serious. He does not take lightly the sins of his people. And we also, who apostatize, become apostates, will be destroyed. And we see that in our day. So many who wave that rainbow flag are being destroyed. All types of schemes are being used against them. But we need to stay faithless. And as we're going to see in the rest of this chapter, God will provide a cleft in the rock, a place in the mountain for us to hide. And that's in the Lord Jesus Christ himself and in his teachings. And that's where we are going to hide. So here we see God mentioned the only true money. Their land also is full of silver and gold. Neither is there any end of their treasure. Their land is also full of horses. Neither is there any end of their chariots. So now we're going to see a warning for Israel that while there was wealth in the land, in Judah, this is when they're falling away. When there was wealth in the land, this is when they're at their worst. And what a message, especially for Europe and America today. So wealthy, so full of ourselves, such advancements in technology, and we hold the world in our hands with our little iPhone. Well, God's going to continue to destroy us and judge us. Maybe nuclear war will come. Who knows? This will grow out of the conflict in Ukraine. You know, things go wrong. But either way, we can't blame God. We blame a wicked generation, whatever's going to befall us. So their land is also full of idols. They worship the work of their own hands, that which their own fingers have made. And the mean man bowed down, and the great man humbled himself. Therefore forgive them not, I enter into the rock, and hide thee in the dust, for fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty. The lofty looks of man shall be humbled, and the audience of man shall be bowed down, and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day. Praise God! For the day of the Lord of Hosts shall be upon everyone that is proud and lofty, and upon everyone that is lifted up, and he shall be brought low, and upon all the cedars of Lebanon that are high and lifted up, and upon all the oaks of Bashan. and upon all the high mountains, upon all the hills that are lifted up, and upon every high tower, and upon every fenced wall, and upon all the ships of Tarshish, and upon all pleasant pictures." Remember, Tarshish was towards Spain, towards the end of the world. "'And the loftiness of man shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness of man shall be made low, and the Lord alone shall be exalted in that day.'" Does this sound like a god? that you should walk into worship as a pastor wanting to look like your flock who's dressed down. Does this sound like the God who wants you in a Hawaiian shirt and sandals or women in short shorts and low cut tops? Does this sound like a God of the covenant that would accept that type of worship? Just a question. And the idols he shall utterly abolish, and they shall go into the holes of the rocks, and into the caves of the earth, for fear of the Lord, and for the glory of his majesty, when he ariseth to shake terribly the earth. In that day a man shall cast his idols of silver, I love this verse, you gotta catch this, and his idols of gold, which they made, each one for himself to worship, to the moles and to the bats. They're going to take their idols, and the holes that a mole would dig in the earth. You're going to take the idols and hide them in those holes for them not to be seen. And where do bats dwell? In caves. And you're going to take this stuff and try and hide it in a cave. You don't want God to see it. You don't want Messiah to see it. You don't want the Lord Jesus to see it. You don't want them to see these things. You're going to be petrified at the judgment that is befalling you for your idolatry. This is the God of the Covenant. This is the terrible God of the Covenant. This is why Melchizedek was not messed with. smack dab in the middle of Sodom and Gomorrah on one side and Canaanites on the other because he took the covenant seriously. And we won't be messed with when we take the covenant seriously and bring the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ and his commandments to this wicked generation. This is the example Markezidek is for us. And this is why the title of today's sermon is The Most Dangerous Man on the Planet. We're not dangerous anymore. That's why they don't respect us. That's why they laugh at us. We've become their friends, the wicked. They don't respect us anymore. And it's a joke. The preaching, the whole culture of the church, it's a joke. So you keep wearing your sandals or dressing down or playing games with God and watch what happens to you. You bring a message that's not serious to the world and see what happens to you. So we need to be dangerous again to this wicked generation. that they have a healthy fear of us as elders in the faith. And you who are elders in the church, be serious with the younger men. Let them know how serious the message is. Push them to be faithful. Am I overemphasizing this? Those of you who might think I'm being too harsh, I will use the words of the New Testament, not the Old, against you as a witness today. why we're in the condition we're in. I am not going to have people that are not faithful play games with me. I am not going to have a pagan or a wicked person confront me in their self-righteousness and I'm going to back down when it comes to the Word of God. I will bring the Word in all its seriousness, in its full weight, whether they like it or not. That's New Testament living and preaching. You don't believe me? Turn to Acts chapter five, verses one through 11, and we'll read it together. So Christian elders, may Christian elders once again be feared in a wicked generation instead of syncretizing with the wicked. What do we mean by syncretizing? It's when you combine two religions to make it more palpable, easier for the wicked to swallow, to digest. We don't do that. We don't practice missionary adaptation. So turn to Acts chapter five with me. This will be the last text that we read together. And actually, I'm sorry, it's Acts, yeah. Yes. So let me get the right text. Hold on one second in my notes. Yes. Let me get the text for us. So here we are in Acts. Let's go back to chapter 5. It's not showing, so let me click on it. Now we got it. Verses 1 to 11. You remember the story of Ananias and Sapphira. What happens? People offering their possessions to the church of their own good will. They wanted to do it, but they did it in a selfish way, in a way for acceptance. in a way to look good, but they were playing games with the covenant. It was in a narcissistic way. They were fooling themselves. They wanted to look good in front of the people. Now let's look what happened. What happened? This is New Testament teaching. Chapter five, verses one through 11. But a certain man named Ananias with Sapphira, his wife, sold the possession and kept back part of the price, his wife also being privy to it, and brought a certain part and laid it at the apostles' feet. But Peter said, let me make sure I'm shrunk down. I'm sorry, I'm doing it again. I will get the hang of this, okay. Actually, it's me, I have to shrink down. Let's see this text together. Again, forgive me. Okay, now let's look at this text together. But a certain man named Ananias with Sapphira, his wife, sold the possession and kept back part of the price, his wife also being privy to it, and brought a certain part and laid it at the apostles' feet." So they sell the land, the parcel, she knows what he did also. But Peter said, Ananias, why hath Satan filled thine heart to lie to the Holy Ghost and to keep back part of the price of the land? While it remained, was it not thine own? And after it was sold, was it not in thine own power? Why hast thou conceived this thing in thine heart? Thou wast not lied unto men, but unto God. And Ananias, hearing these words, fell down and gave up the ghost. And great fear came on all of them that heard these things. So when God starts something, He'll be very serious in the judgment to set an example. There was fear amongst the people for God, for his word, and for his apostles of respect. This man sold a piece of land and lied, making like he gave all of it to the church and he only gave part of it and kept part of it for himself because he wanted to look good in front of the people. And God killed him. God killed him. And the young men arose, wound him up, and carried him out and buried him. And it was about the space of three hours after when his wife, not knowing what was done, came in. And Peter answered unto her, Tell me, whether ye sold the land for so much? And she said, Yeah, for so much. Then Peter said unto her, How is it that ye have agreed together to tempt the Spirit of the Lord? Behold, the feet of them which have buried thy husband are at the door, and shall carry thee out. Then she fell down straightway at his feet, and yielded up the ghost. And the young men came in and found her dead, and carrying her forth, buried her by her husband. and great fear. Am I lying? Am I lying? And great fear came upon all the church and upon as many as heard these things." Now, how can we read this part of Scripture? How can we read this, the New Testament text, and then go back to spoiling our children in the church, going to church with slippers on, women going to church like they're going to a nightclub, men going to church like they're going to watch the football game? and everything's fine and dandy with the way we're behaving and with the way we're doing things. Ask me if I'm overreacting now, if this is a silly sermon and I'm overreacting with the way I'm preaching and teaching this. So Melchizedek, the most dangerous man on the planet, they feared him because he was faithful and because he was dangerous and he was deadly serious. And even Abraham, as we had to see, delaying his circumcision of Isaac, lying in Egypt when it came to saying his wife isn't his wife, but his sister, because he was afraid he would be killed. His faith had to mature. And we see the same thing with Lot. But Melchizedek was not so. And when you are deadly serious with the covenant and the gospel, the covenant that was fulfilled by the Lord Jesus Christ, and when you are serious again with God and serious with your children and your grandchildren and with everyone around you, and you faithfully warn them to love God and to fear Him, In the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ, you will be a dangerous person. You will be a person to be feared again. Don't take on the syncretistic preaching and teaching that we have today where they are enveloped with the culture. So if you go to a church and your pastor's dressed like he's going to a football game or he's going to the beach or whatever, let him know. Let them know. Let the people know. When they come dressed for church, the same way they do walking around a Walmart, let them know. That's not being humble. Even slaves had that outfit reserved for Sunday because it was a Sabbath and you were going to meet God. And then we wonder why this country's going to continue to get smashed, and Europe as well. So take this message, take it seriously, please. And we'll end on that note. So let us pray. Almighty God, the great and living God, the God we fear and love, the God who loves us, we pray, Lord, we would, all of us, would take your word seriously again, myself included, where I become slack on certain days in the way I do things for you, that we would be serious again, Lord, that I myself would not be a hypocrite. We pray, Lord, that you bless us and take care of us during the week until we meet again. And we always, we always end our prayers in the name of the one who is even greater than Melchizedek, our great King, Priest, and Prophet, the Lord Jesus Christ. Amen. God bless you and be well.