She's recording it on zoom as
we do this all right the book of Zechariah and we're in chapter
5 and The title of our lesson tonight is the weight of sin
the weight of sin if we had any idea if we had any concept of Sin in our natural state We would be of all men most miserable. And we're thankful that after
the Lord saves us by his grace, he gives us a shadow of it. He
gives us a little understanding of it. He takes us to the cross.
He causes us to see the one who gave himself a ransom for many. to pay the price. That is as
close as we'll ever get to the enormity of our sin. Well, Zachariah
is used as a prophet of God, as a preacher of the gospel,
to share a picture of what sin is like. Now we've seen here
in the book of Zachariah chapter 5 that the thoughts have changed
from blessings to the church to this is what the problem is.
And we saw that in the last couple times in the last couple studies
that there is a ifa here. Now an ifa in the Old Testament
was a form of measurement, dry measurement, generally speaking.
And this ifa is a monstrous ifa. It's a very large ifa. You know,
when we studied about the table of showbread, we found out that
those loaves of bread were were several pounds apiece. They were
huge loaves of bread. And it just shares with us that
the Lord has bread aplenty for all his church. He can give us
full loaves. And that's the blessing of Christ,
the bread of life, the bread to the church. Well, here we
find that there's an Ifa, and it's a monstrous Ifa. It's a
very large Ifa, after we saw that scroll written on both sides
about the crimes that natural man has committed against God.
And that is robbing God, robbing God of his glory. Now, we truly
cannot rob God of his glory. I mean, God's in his glory at
all times. But he says, you have robbed
me. He tells us the world in Malachi,
you have robbed me. Can a man rob God? You have robbed
me, Israel. So in a sense, we rob God when
we give glory for our salvation to ourself or to some man or
to some system. We're robbing God of his glory.
And then we're thieves. And then it says, we don't tell
the truth, false swearing in my name, as he brings it out. Well, verse 5 of this chapter
says, then the angel that talked with me went forth and said unto
me, lift up now thine eyes, and see what is this that goeth forth. And I said, what is it? And he
said, this is an ephah that goeth forth. It's a giant form of measurement. We're going to find out this
is the measian, measurement for wickedness. It goes on to say,
he said, moreover, this is their resemblance through all the earth.
And this ephah travels the entire world. Nobody is exempt from
this problem that we face. Nobody is exempt from the fall.
And nobody is exempt from the death that came by the fall.
Let and behold, there was lifted up a talent of lead. In John
Gill's commentary, he said this talent is about 125 pounds. And lead, 125 pounds of lead
is 190 pounds of anything else. It just is so massive. Well,
it's a talent of lead. Now, this talent of lead is the
covering to this ephah. It's the covering that goes over
it. It tells us here. This is the ephah, verse six,
that goeth forth. He said, moreover, this is their
resemblance through all the earth. And behold, there was lifted
up a talent of lead. And this is a woman that sitteth
in the midst of the ephah. And he said, this is wickedness. And he cast it upon the midst
of the ephah, and cast the weight of the lead upon the mouth thereof.
So this woman is symbolic of wickedness, and they close the
lid back. A lot of weight placed upon this
ephah, and it keeps the wickedness in there, but in fact, it holds
it down. And the Lord is sharing with
us here that there is absolutely no way in our ability to get
rid of the weight that is upon us, the weight of sin, the weight
of wickedness. And the scriptures share so much
about this subject. And so what it does for the church,
what it did for Zachariah, I am convinced, and what it did for
other ministers of the gospel during his time, when we read
about the wickedness of natural man and the wickedness that we're
saved out of, it makes the church thankful for grace. We come out
thankful for grace. If God would save us from this,
how gracious is our God. And none of the ability to get
out from under this load is in our hands. We may wrestle with
it. We used to do that on January
1st, wrestle with this load. We made New Year's resolutions. And what we're going to try to
do is get rid of part of this load. We're under it, but we're
trying to get rid of part of it. And it never works. And I
remember reading Benjamin Franklin. He worked very hard on it. And
by the time he got to the end of his list, he was starting
what he'd already gotten rid of part of the list. Well, there's
no way that we can get out from under this load of lead, this
load of sin. 150 pounds, 125 pounds of weight
on us. We just can't wrestle ourself
out from under it. So we find that there is certainly
a great need for a savior. But let's look at a few things
here in the scriptures. We're permitted to see a picture
of the greatness of sin and a lid on the greatness of sin. Inside
of here is wickedness. And this ephah travels over the
whole world. Nobody is exempt from this. Nobody that is a descendant of
Adam is exempt from the problem. We are all under this condemnation
of sin. Now, turn with me, if you would,
to the book of Jeremiah, chapter eight. Jeremiah, chapter eight. Jeremiah, chapter eight. We have
Jeremiah's comment. Now, Jeremiah's gonna spend time
with Israel. Not many people, during the time
of the Lord Jesus, had read the book of Jeremiah. It's quite
apparent, because most of the people that the Lord dealt with
were not sinners. But Jeremiah spends a lot of time talking
about Israel having a problem about sin. So just like everybody
else, they, being for an experiment purpose, to demonstrate that
even those who are taken care of so carefully as he took care
of Israel, left to themselves, would never come to God, would
never trust Christ. It takes the grace of God. So
Jeremiah chapter 8 and verse 14, we have these words. Why
do you sit still? Assemble yourselves and let us
enter into the fenced cities and let. I didn't read far enough. Here
we go. I'm gun shy. For the Lord our God hath put
us to silence, and given us water of gall to drink, because we
have sinned against the Lord. Now this is Jeremiah's words
against Israel, and this is repeated time and time again in the prophets
of the Old Testament. Israel had sinned against God
through the book of Numbers Deuteronomy Leviticus over and over again
they are pointed out from for sinning against God let's just
move a little bit further in the book of Lamentations the
Lamentations of Jeremiah the next book here Lamentations chapter
1 verse 8 Lamentations chapter 8 we read these words Says, Jeremiah,
excuse me, Jerusalem hath grievously sinned. Therefore she is reproved. All that honored her despise
her, because they have seen her nakedness. Yea, she scythed and
turneth backwards. Her filthiness is in her skirt,
she remembered. not her last end. Therefore,
she came down wonderfully. She had no comforter. O Lord,
behold my affliction, for the enemy hath magnified himself. There in verse eight, Jerusalem
hath grievously sinned. Not only has Israel sinned, but
the very heart and core of Israel has sinned. And that's Jerusalem.
And at Jerusalem, what was at Jerusalem? The temple was at
Jerusalem. The worship was at Jerusalem.
The priest was at Jerusalem. The king was at Jerusalem. And
many of the prophets were at Jerusalem. And yet, in the lamentations
of Jeremiah, with concern about Jerusalem, it is grievously sinned. They have lied about God. They have robbed God. They have
gone to the nth degree. in this attitude towards God
just like that ephah filled with wickedness and covered with lead
and that wickedness cannot escape we just can't get out from under
it in the book of Daniel Daniel comes up and Daniel chapter 9
verse 11 Daniel chapter 9 verse 11 now he does something that
most people don't do most religious people won't do he included himself
in the problem He is part of the problem. That's the difference
between a religionist and a grace person. A religionist, like the
Pharisees, Lord, I thank Thee that I'm not like other men.
But Daniel, here in chapter 9 and verse 11, shares this. Yea, all
Israel have transgressed thy law, even by departing, that
they might not obey thy voice. Therefore, the curse is poured
upon us, and the oath that was written in the law of Moses,
the servant of God, because we have sinned against thee. Daniel
recognized that he was in the mix. He recognized that he was
part of the problem. He was a sinner before God, and
that's good ground. The Lord loves sinners. The Lord
died for sinners. The Lord propitiated for sinners.
The Lord made an atonement for sinners. This is glorious. Daniel puts himself in this line. Jeremiah, in Jeremiah and Lamentations,
says, Israel is sin, Jerusalem is sin. And Daniel says, I'm
right in the mix. Where is he? As a result of the
sin of Judah and Benjamin, he's in the mix of it. But he is a
prophet, a preacher, an apostle. He is a declarer of the gospel
that knows where he came from. Saul of Tarsus, later Paul, put
it in much the same way, O wretched man that I am. He recognizes
the fact that sin had separated Him from God, that wickedness
had separated Him from God, and that Jesus Christ had made a
propitiation, atonement, laid down His life, a ransom for it.
And that causes us to recognize the fact that we're just like
everybody else but sinners saved by grace. Sinners saved by grace. Romans! Romans chapter 3. You know that passage of scripture?
You probably have shared this with people in religion. I know
I did. Romans chapter 3. Well, we're going to take them
to this verse, and to that verse, and to this verse, and to that
verse. And by the time we get through, we hope we have them
won to Jesus. Well, that was what was used on me. Romans chapter 3 and verse 23. Romans 3.23 says, for all have
sinned and come short of the glory of God. For all have sinned
and come short of the glory of God. And then just a couple of
pages over there, chapter five. And verse 12, chapter 5, verse
12, wherefore, as by one man, oh my goodness, we're getting
back to Genesis. We're getting back to Adam. We're
getting back to the fall. What happened in the fall? Well,
God's word had to become fulfilled. God was not just talking to Adam.
God shared with him, the day you eat, you shall surely die. Now, how complete was that? Completely. There was one aspect that people
look at and think, well, Adam wasn't quite as bad as all that
because he was still alive. But he was alive with an appointment
with death, but his spirit died instantly. He no longer had a
relationship with God. He hid himself from God. He tried
to provide his own righteousness, self-righteousness, covering
himself with fig leaves. And we can just go down the list
of what Adam did according to his own belief system that he
now had. He no longer had the belief system
that he had before. That was all erased. We cannot
have a positive belief system about God because that was erased
in the fall. We have only one belief system,
and that is we can make it on our own. And yet, we don't understand
the problem. Not only are we sinners, and
not only are we in that great ephah, but we have lead sitting
on top of us, and it's preventing us from ever getting out from
the problem. Well, that's where the great
God of heaven comes in. He's able to deal with that.
And to make the matter more significant, there is a symbol of lead put
upon it. My dad said, never cut lead with
your knife. It'll take the edge right off
of it. There's lots of things about lead. It's used for sewer
pipe. Lead, heavy, massive, restrictive. If it's laid on you, a talent
of lead is laid on you, it becomes something that is an obstruction
that you just have trouble getting out from under. Now, proportion
to our size is the amount of lead that's put on us. Just as
that ephah was a great ephah, the lead, the size of the lead,
the amount of lead that is put on everybody, symbolically speaking,
is proportion to our size, to our sin. So it just magnifies
itself. The talon of lead is a lid, inside
is a woman, and we find out that this is wickedness. This is wickedness. It's not a real woman in there,
it's just symbolic of the terror of sin. The terror of natural
problem we have with God, the offense of it. This whole thing
is an offense to God. The things we think about God,
I was listening to a couple of preachers tonight on that Zoom
meeting and they said, sometimes I just get bothered about what
I said about God before I was saved. Well, sometimes I have
to repent too, but God's taken care of it. It was an offense. It's offensive to what we said
about God, but thank God His forgiveness is complete and payment
for sin is total. So there's nothing left. Nothing
before us. We're weighted down. Nothing in ourselves to remove
this weight. Besides being weighted down,
we're naturally spiritually dead. Can you imagine putting weight
on a dead person? This weight is on a dead person.
It's doubly hard for the person to be raised. It's hard. It's impossible for the person.
But think of what power it would take to raise somebody that has
a talent of lead on them, an impossible position that they're
in that they can raise themselves from the dead, from the spiritual
dead. Now we may walk around animate, our hearts beating,
we'll live to the day that the Lord has appointed for us to
pass this world and go to the next. We never die before our
time, and we never die after our time. There is an appointed
time. And after that, we stand before
God. Righteous, made righteous in this life by
the righteousness of Christ, or unrighteous, but we'll stand
before God. Now, lead on top of it, it reminded
me of that passage of scripture again over in the book of Jeremiah.
Would you turn there with me again to the book of Jeremiah?
It's brought out this way in the book of Jeremiah. Think of
that lid of lead laying on top of that ephah. containing This
wickedness going over all the world here in the book of Jeremiah
chapter 13 you know I've read four translations,
and it's always the same word, so I'm just going to use it Jeremiah 13 verse 23 Can the Ethiopian, now just think
of this person with this lead, talent of lead. They're dead
and the talent of lead is on them. And Jeremiah brings up
this question, can an Ethiopian change his skin? And the next,
or a leopard his spots. Now he's asking them to deal
with two things they know about. Natural occurrences in this world.
I'm convinced that many people that Jeremiah was writing to
was familiar with both of them. Or he would not have brought
them up. And then he goes on and completes this verse of scripture
and says, then, well the answer is absolutely no. Then may ye
also do good, which are accustomed to do evil. Just as much as it's
impossible for that, it's impossible for this. for people dead in
trespasses and sin to do good that are accustomed to doing
evil, to do living things when they are dead. That's just an
impossibility. We've got too much lead on us.
Not only do we have sin, but there's lead on top of the sin,
reminding us of it all the time. The weight is heavy. The very
weight of our sin is heavy, and then to have this added, just
picture about that. Jeremiah chapter 2 would you
back up to Jeremiah chapter 2? Jeremiah chapter 2 there in verse
22 Jeremiah chapter 2 in verse 22 we have these words for though
thou wash thee with niter and Take thee much soap Yet thine
iniquity is marked before me saith the Lord God All the religious washings that
you go through cannot remove the problem. Though you wash
thee with niter, with bleach, and though you take soap, yet
thine iniquity is marked before me, saith the Lord. Now this
is our state, in our unconverted state. Now, you know, after we're
saved, we still have this old body. But you know, we can wake
up every morning. His blessings are new every morning. And what does he say to his church
every morning? I put your sins away. What's he say every night? I
put your sins away. I propitiated for you. I atoned
for you. I ransomed you. So these blessings
that the Holy Spirit brings to us every morning, and then at
9 o'clock too, and 10 o'clock, and 11 o'clock, and through the
day, and we wake up in the night seasons. The words come, Lord,
you have taken my sins away. They're as far as the east is
from the west. Oh, wretched man that I am, but
you've taken care of that. You've taken the heavy load off.
You paid the price for all my sin and then took care of the
lead too. So what a blessing it is here. And then in chapter
5 and verse 3, chapter 5 and verse 3, we read this. The impossibility
to take care of the problem is too big for us. We're unable. Just says, by saying a few words,
you can take care of this. Or do a few things, you can take
care of this. Or if you're good to your neighbor,
you can take care of this. Or you're good to your family.
You're just a nice guy. You can take care of this. I
heard mentioned tonight, all you have to do is check the obituaries,
and nobody's going to hell. Everybody's in heaven. Well,
we know that's not true. But here, notice Jeremiah chapter
5 and verse 3, it says, O Lord, are not thine eyes upon the truth?
Thou hast stricken them, but they have not grieved. What did
he do to Israel? And yet they did not grieve.
It's not our problem. Those people that went in and
spied out the land, we're eventually going to get to that point in
the book of Numbers. Those spies, it wasn't their
problem. They have not grieved. Thou hast
consumed them, but they have refused to receive correction. We're just, we got too much weight
on us. Sin is so horrific. And then on top of that is this
weight that's placed upon us by nature. We're born with this
condition. We never get over it in this
life. We never get it over in our life
unless the Lord lifts that load off. And that load was placed
on him. Just think of the weight that
was put on him. He took all the sin plus all that lead. Goes
on to tell us there in Jeremiah chapter 5 and verse 3, it says,
but they have refused to receive correction. They have made their
faces harder than a rock. They have refused to return. They set their faces aflint to
refuse to return. Well, we're so thankful for sovereign
grace. We're so thankful that he would
take the initiative to lift us out of a horrible pit, that he
would take the initiative before time began to write names in
the Lamb's Book of Life, to give a gift to the Son, unbeknownst
to us in all our sin. But after he gives us the new
birth, we find out what blessings he has for us, what blessings
he is to us, that he would take care of all the problem. The
book of Isaiah, on your way, chapter 17 of the book of Jeremiah.
What a weight we have, Jeremiah chapter 17 and verse 9. Jeremiah chapter 17 and verse
9. This word desperately wicked
is a cancer. Incurably wicked. That's what
that word means. Desperately. Incurably. There
is no cure in the human being or all human beings. No confessional
will take care of it. No repeating after me will take
care of it. No going forward will take care of it. It's an
incurable disease. And that's where the great physician
comes in. He could cure all. Well, let's
just read this. It says in Jeremiah chapter 17
and there in verse 9, it says, for thus saith the Lord, excuse
me, 17 and verse 9, the heart is deceitful above all things
and desperately wicked. It's too heavy to know it. Too
much weight on it. We'll never understand it. Who
can know it? We don't know our own heart.
We only know the hearts of other people, don't we? They're really bad. We know them,
but we don't know ours. The heart is deceitful above
all things and desperately wicked. Who can know it? So we're so
thankful that God knows the desperateness of our situation. That he would
have all of this desperateness, this desperate weight, desperate
sin, incurable sin, weight that we can't deal with. He would
impute that to his son. He would take that to his son
in Isaiah. Back up to chapter one of the
book of Isaiah. Just a short verse there that
Isaiah starts out with the book of Isaiah. Kinda is a theme through
here. Even when we get to Isaiah 53,
there's a reason for him being. having our sins laid on. We are
sinners. Isaiah 1-5, why should ye be
stricken any more? Ye will revolt more and more.
The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faint. From the sole
of the foot, even unto the head, there is no soundness in it,
but wounds and bruises and putrefying sores, that they have not been
closed, neither bound up, neither mollified with ointment. So here's
a description, a spiritual description of natural man has nothing about
him that there's any soundness at all. There's deadness and
weight on top of the deadness. You know, it's wonderful when
we go through verses of scripture like this that we get to run
into places like Ezekiel and the Valley of Dry Bones. There in Ezekiel chapter 37,
we have a valley of dry bones. And if there is anything that
could describe us in our natural condition, it's this valley of
dry bones. There's no hope for this valley
of dry bones. It is desperately wicked. Who
can know it? It's desperately dry. It's very
dry. You know, all of the life is
gone. There's no sinews on the bones. There's no muscle on the
bone. It's all gone. All appearance of life is gone. It's very illustrative of the
very point that God makes throughout the scriptures about natural
man. Even though people will tell us, well, this is talking
about Israel. Commentators will tell us, well, of course it is.
Of course it is. It's talking about spiritual
Israel. Now that's the people that God's gonna deal with like
this. It's not the world in general, it's spiritual Israel. It's Israel,
the spiritual part. And there in the book of Jeremiah,
or excuse me, Ezekiel chapter 37, it illustrates this point
so well that we've been looking at about this wickedness. Just
describes it in other terms. I don't think any of us have
ever been in a place where we have
not seen some dead bones. Just walk out in the desert a
little bit. My grandkids, my grandsons just
love finding a dead mouse. All the skin gone, the bones
are just there. They see the teeth, and they
see the ribs. And from the critters there on
up. But there's absolutely no life at all whatsoever. It's all been gone. And here
we read this wonderful passage of scripture in chapter 37. The
hand of the Lord was upon me, verse one, carried me out into
in the spirit of the Lord to set me down in the midst of a
valley which was full of bones. Great battle, it doesn't say. They caused me to pass by and
look around, and behold, there were very many in the open valley,
and lo, they were very dry. The description goes on, just
like we find that ephah filled with wickedness, covered with
lead. Very bad place, very, very dry. This is an impossible situation,
because the Lord's going to say, and He said unto me, Son of man,
preacher, preacher, Sunday school teacher. family member. What do you see here? Can these
bones live? Well, Ezekiel gave the only right answer. Lord, oh Lord God, thou knowest. Oh Lord God, thou knowest. Is
God going to save our family? Lord God, thou knowest. Very
dry bones. And then he said, Prophesy, preach
to these bones. What a useless experience that
Ezekiel was going through. What useless to preach to a valley
of dry bones. This is just useless. What good
is this going to be? Well, with God, nothing shall
be impossible. So he goes on to say, prophesy
to these bones and say unto them, O ye dry bones, hear the word
of the Lord. Can they hear the word of the
Lord? Thus saith the Lord God unto these bones, behold, I will
cause breath to enter unto you, and ye shall live. Now when God
says that, that's gonna happen. When Ezekiel says that, it's
in the hands of God. I don't know what's gonna happen
here. But he was faithful in doing what he was asked to do.
And I'll lay sinews upon you, and bring up flesh upon you,
and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and ye shall
live, and ye shall know that I am the Lord. How wonderful
is that? There's every spiritual blessing
is given to us in Christ Jesus, the one that gives us life. So
this is an impossibility. We're in an ephah filled with
wickedness, covered with lead, and God says, preacher, go over
there and preach to that valley of dry bones. Now, are they going
to live? And he says, only you know. Only you know. Now, we know from
scripture that everyone that was given to the son by the father
will come unto him. And he that cometh unto him,
I will in no wise cast out. We know that. We just don't know
who they are. God does. And then that wonderful
passage over in the New Testament in John chapter 11, when Jesus
said this to a man that had been in a tomb for four days. Lazarus,
come forth. Now, it wasn't that Lazarus could
come out on his own, or he would have. Those sisters would have
prayed him out of there, if they could have. Lord, if you'd have
been here, this would not have happened. And he said, I'm the
resurrection and the life. We know that you'll raise him
in the last day. John chapter 11, verse 43. Those wonderful words of the
Lord, and this is what he does. from a spiritual context to every
one of his children. Dead in trespasses and sin, heavy
weight of sin upon them, inability on their part to ever get out
from under it. And here he says in John chapter 11, verse 43,
these wonderful words, Lazarus, he says with a loud voice too.
Lazarus, come forth. And we see it happen. Lazarus came out of that tomb. It was an irresistible call. Lazarus had no ability of himself. He has a weight on him, a bunch
of dead skin, dead bones, dead. He was dead and incurably dead,
left to himself. Jesus said, I know, or said it,
or his brother said it in the resurrection at the end. All
right, one other passage of scripture found in the book of Acts, chapter
26. Acts chapter 26, verse 8. Paul is speaking to Agrippa.
And notice these words, because they're for us. Why should it
be thought a thing incredible with you that God should raise
the dead? That's what God does all the
time. Why? He's talking to an unbeliever. But I'm looking at this and saying,
God does this all the time. raises people from the dead. Why should it be thought a thing
incredible with you that God should raise the dead? I verily
thought with myself that I ought to do many things contrary to
the name of Jesus of Nazareth, which thing I also did in Jerusalem. And many of the saints did I
shut up in prison, having received authority from the chief priest.
And when they were put to death, I gave my voice against them."
This guy is in an ephah filled with wickedness, and a big lead
lid is on top. And yet, The Lord raised Him
from the dead. What glorious things God has
for His people. Now, that passage of scripture
over there in the book of Zechariah, it's an immeasurable ephah, filled
with immeasurable wickedness, covered with immeasurable weight.
And the only hope for our state, our situation in that state,
is to hear that voice of the Lord Jesus. Come forth.