I hope you'll follow along in
your Bible with me this morning and look at the book of Jeremiah
chapter 23. Jeremiah chapter 23. I do hope
that at least some who listen to this follow along in their
Bibles because I want nothing more than for you to see and
hear what God is truly saying from His words. My words are
not important. The words of any man do not matter. Only what God's Word says. And
we must look at it for ourselves. I hope you'll be like the noble
Bereans, those Jewish Bereans who, after hearing the apostles
preach, Went home, opened their Bibles and searched the Scriptures
to see if what they were saying was so. I hope you'll do that. Jeremiah 23. Now, the true prophets
of God in the Old Testament were lone voices in their generation. They were saying something quite
different from the many, many false prophets of their day. Men such as Isaiah, Jeremiah,
Daniel, Ezekiel, Malachi. They all went against modern
thought. They were against what the majority
of religious leaders were saying. They were saying things exactly
the opposite of what the modern religious preachers or prophets
were saying. Now, the vast majority of the
prophets were telling the people lies in God's name. They were telling the people
God said this, God said that, when God said no such thing. When nowhere was it written in
the book of Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. This was basically the Bible
that they had in the time of the prophet. Nowhere did God
say the things that the prophets were saying. And then the true
prophets, such as Isaiah, Jeremiah, simply yet boldly declared what
the living and true God did say. They were simply saying what
God did say from His Word, and everyone hated them because they
told the truth. Why? Because the natural man
hates the truth. That's what Paul said in 1 Corinthians
2, the natural man receiveth not the things of God, neither
can he know them. They're foolishness to him. Well,
because man hates the truth, because the truth doesn't say
nice things about us. They hated what Isaiah and Jeremiah
and the other prophets were saying because it was contrary to what
the false prophets were saying. The false prophets were saying
things that the people liked to hear. The false prophets were
saying, peace, peace, that God has a wonderful plan for your
life and God loves you so much and doesn't want anything bad
to happen to you. Well, the people loved to hear
that when they were rebels and sinners against God. The true
prophets were saying, God is angry. Repent or perish. True prophets weren't telling
the people how much God loved them. No, they were telling them,
God is angry every day. It wasn't a God of love who destroyed
Sodom and Gomorrah. It wasn't a God of love who destroyed
the whole world in Noah's day. Well, since the prophets were
just they were telling the truth and people don't like the truth,
God's Word, what it truly says. And consequently, the true prophets
were killed, the people killed them for the truth's sake, same
with the apostles and even the Son of God himself. People, listen, it wasn't the
Roman government that killed the Son of God. It was good,
moral, sincere, Sabbath-keeping religious people. Why? Because
of the truth. The truth He told about God,
about man, about salvation. Jeremiah 23, verse 9. Jeremiah says in verse 9, My
heart within me is broken because of the prophets. all my bones
shake. I'm like a drunken man, a man
whom wine hath overcome because of the Lord and because of the
words of His holiness." Jeremiah said, I'm sick because of what
I'm hearing from these prophets. People, it makes me sick what
I'm hearing today and the foolishness that's going on in the name of
God. All that men are saying All the men are posting on their
bulletin boards that God was supposed to have said when He
said no such thing. Jeremiah said, My heart is sick
because of the words of God's holiness. That is, they're not
telling what God's Word says. They're telling what they say,
what they think He said. David said this in Psalm 119,
verse 126. He said, It's time for you, Lord,
to work. They've made void your law, your
word. It's time for you to work, Lord,
he says. They've made void. Nobody seems
to care what your word is saying. In spite of what God's Word says
about everything, Men and women don't seem to care. They're going
to do what they want to do. And the only way they can do
that is to silence the Word of God and hire them a preacher
to tell them what they want to hear. That's why they're called
hirelings. Well, Jeremiah 23, verse 13,
he goes on to say, I've seen folly in the prophets of Samaria. I've seen folly, foolishness,
other absurdities. that go on in the prophets of
our day. Listen carefully. If you're not
reading, please listen. I'm reading from the Word of
God. Verse 14, he says, I have seen also in the prophets of
Jerusalem a horrible thing. They commit adultery and walk
in lies and strengthen also the hands of evildoers. that none doth return from his
wickedness. They are all unto me as Sodom,
and inhabitants thereof as Gomorrah." God says through Jeremiah that
these false prophets strengthened the hands of evildoers. How? How did they strengthen their
hands? By telling them that God loves
them, that God won't punish sin. So it makes them think it's all
right, I can continue doing what I'm doing. It's OK. When God said there in that verse,
there like unto me is Sodom and Gomorrah. God destroyed that whole city
full of hundreds of thousands of people, maybe a million or
more. That's not the God of love, people. It's a God who's angry
with the wicked. And God hasn't changed. Keep
reading with me. Keep reading. Verses 16 through
18. Jeremiah 23. Thus saith the Lord
of hosts, hearken not unto the words of the prophets that prophesy
unto you. They make you vain. They speak
a vision of their own heart and not out of the mouth of the Lord. They say, I'm still reading verse
17, they say still unto them that despise me, the Lord has
said, you shall have peace. And they say unto everyone that
walks after the imagination of his own heart, no evil shall
come upon you. And he goes on to say here in
verse 18, who stood in the counsel of the Lord and perceived and
heard his word, who marked his word and heard it? In other words,
God says, where did I say that? Where in God's word does it say
that God loves you? Where does it say Jesus loves
you? Where does it say that? Show me. Most of these fellows have taken
John 3.16 and created a whole false notion of God from that. I'm going to read several verses
from God's Word for you in a moment. I hope you'll listen. Maybe you've
never heard them before. It's the same word. Let me give
you an illustration. There used to be a talk show,
a moderator named Morton Downey. He was a loudmouth, bold fellow,
a very brash fellow, Morton Downey. And he had on his show one time
religious leaders of our day or preachers and priests. He had a Catholic priest. He
had a Methodist fellow, a Baptist fellow, Episcopalian woman or
whatever, all these religious leaders. And they were all saying
the same thing. Morton Downey kept asking each
one of them, what does God's word say? What do you say about
God, about man? They all kept saying, well, God
loves everybody, and Jesus died for everybody. And that irreligious
talk show host, Morton Downing, he said, now let me get this
straight. God loves me. And they all, all these religious
fellows, they said, that's right, God loves you. And he said, and
Jesus died for my sins. He came down here to die for
me. God loves me. And Jesus died
for them. And they all said, that's right.
That's right. That's what he said. And that religious man, that
irreligious man, he said, then what have I got to worry about?
What have any of us got to worry about? God loves us. And Jesus died for our sins.
What have we got to worry about? That irreligious man knew more
than those religious people did. He was more rational and reasonable
than they were. In verses 19 and 20 here of Jeremiah
23, he says this, Behold, a whirlwind of the Lord is gone forth in
fury, a grievous whirlwind. It shall fall grievously upon
the head of the wicked. The anger of the Lord shall not
return until he is executed. Please perform the thoughts of
his heart. In the latter days, you are going
to consider it perfectly. My, my. Listen to Psalm 5, verse
5 and 6, in case you've never heard these verses. Psalm 5,
verse 5 and 6 says, The foolish shall not stand in thy sight.
Thou hatest all workers of iniquity. Thou hatest all workers of iniquity. God hates all workers of iniquity. You ever heard that? No. All
you've heard from a preacher is John 3, 16. Which, by the way, I believe.
But you better read what it says in John 3.14 through 18. What
does John 3.18 say? Have you ever read that? Do you
know what it says? It says that he that believeth not is condemned
already. And it says in the very last
verse in John chapter 3 that some people are under the wrath
of God. God's Word is not contradictory, people. We're the ones confused. Verse 6 in Psalm 5 says, He will
destroy them that speak lies. The Lord will abhor, that is,
hate the bloody and deceitful man. It doesn't say the Lord
will hate his sins but love him. Nowhere does it say that in God's
Word, that God loves the sinner but hates his sins. Nowhere does
it say that in God's Word. Here it says God hates all workers
of iniquity. It says God abhors the bloody
and deceitful man. Read Proverbs 6 for yourself. What it says, six things that
the Lord hates, yea, seven are an abomination to Him. And all
those things He hates are people. Psalm 7. I'm still reading God's
Word, verse 11. God judges the righteous. God
is angry with the wicked every day. I've got to hurry. My time's about up. Over in Malachi,
listen to this. Listen very carefully. In the
book of Malachi, chapter 2, verse 17, you've wearied the Lord with
your words, he says, and yet you say, wherein have we wearied
him? And he answers, When you say, everyone that doeth evil
is good in the sight of the Lord, and he delights in them. He says, you wearied God with
your words by telling everybody that's evil in his sight that
God loves them. Where is the God of judgment? Malachi asked. Where is the God
of judgment? I asked the same thing. Well,
he's on the throne and he's judging right now. I'm judging right
now. Read Isaiah chapter 1 for yourself. Read Romans chapter 1 for yourself. Read these things. Read God's
Word. Listen to a man who will tell you what God's Word is really
saying. Well, until next Sunday, may
the Lord use this Word to open the eyes of some. This is my
prayer. Amen. Thank you. Bye.