Thank you, thank you. Our subject
tonight is holiness. Our text will be the 19th chapter
of the Gospel of Leviticus. I ask you to open your Bible
there and just hold it open on your laps as we look at these
37 verses of inspiration together. There's much talk in the religious
world about holiness, much talk but very little understanding. People use the word very commonly,
but very few people have any understanding of what the scriptures
teach concerning this matter of holiness. God's holiness refers
to the wholeness of his being, his whole being. It is God's
whole being that sets him apart from all the imaginary gods of
men and sets him apart from all his creatures. He is holy in
that there is none like him, none to be compared to him. He
and he alone is God. That sets him apart from all
creation infinitely. Many talk about our holiness
as men and women, as believers. horribly confusing and evil ways. Commonly, the doctrine of reformed
folks, of legal folks, with regard to holiness is that God begins
his work of grace in the believer and gives us a new nature. He
makes the old man new and begins his work of grace in us, beginning
sanctification. And that man, by great exercise,
if we pray enough, discipline ourselves enough, If we pray
enough and read the Bible enough, pray enough and fast enough,
go to church enough, sacrifice enough, then we grow in holiness
and grow in sanctification until at last the believer is ripe
for heaven and the Lord takes him home. That's just a hairbreadth
short of sinless perfectionism as taught by Pentecostals. It
is totally contrary to Scripture. Believers grow in their relationship
with God. We grow in the grace of God. We grow in faith and in love. But we do not make ourselves
more holy by anything we do. In the new birth, God puts a
new man in you, Christ Jesus, that holiness without which no
man shall see the Lord. And that man is the perfect holy
man who cannot sin that's born of God. The old man constantly
warring against him. Nothing about the old nature
has changed. Every believer knows that. Every
believer knows that. He's confronted with it every
day. We're as evil and as vile today
as we've ever been. But that new man in us is created
in righteousness and in true holiness. There are those among
the various fundamental groups and Pentecostal groups who have
much the same idea with regard to holiness and progressive sanctification
as being a work of man. If you read the scriptures with
any care, you will find that the words sanctify, sanctified,
and sanctification, all of them the same word as is commonly
used for holy or holiness, are never used in a progressive sense
with regard to the believer. they're never attributed to you
and me. Our holiness is God's work of
grace in us, in, by, and with Christ Jesus. But this is what
God says about holiness. Look at verse 1. The Lord God
spake unto Moses, saying, speak unto all the congregation of
the children of Israel and say unto them, ye shall be holy for
I the Lord your God am holy. This is God's word to his elect
in all ages, in all places, in all circumstances. Ye shall be holy for I the Lord
your God am holy. Because God is holy, perfect
in the entirety of his being, he requires and will accept nothing
less than perfect holiness. It shall be perfect to be accepted. God will not, God cannot embrace
and accept anything less than that which is perfectly righteous,
perfectly holy, perfect before Him. The Apostle Paul says, follow
peace with all men and holiness without which no man shall see
the Lord. You must have that holiness that
God requires, that holiness that God performs, that holiness that
God gives in Christ Jesus the Lord, or you shall never stand
before him in heavenly glory. Now, let's look at God's command
again. Ye shall be holy, for I the Lord
your God am holy. In this 37th chapter, or in this
17th, 19th chapter, I'll get it right in a minute, of Leviticus,
the Lord God here gives us three things with regard to holiness.
A declaration, a call, and a motive. May God the Holy Ghost, whose
word we have before us, be our teacher. Number one, let me state
this again, and state it emphatically, and I'll be brief in stating
it, but it must be stated at the beginning. This is a declaration
of grace. The Lord God is not declaring
that we should be holy. He is not declaring that we must
be holy as good as we can. He's not declaring that we must
mostly be holy. He declares you shall be holy. Holy because he makes us so. This is not a recommendation,
but a declaration. A declaration of grace made to
a specific people. Now the word holy has two distinct
meanings. Both definitions of the word
must be understood and applied. To be holy is to be separate, distinct, peculiar, severed from
all others. That which is holy peculiar. It's distinct. It's not like
anything else. It's not treated like anything
else. It's set aside. It's separated. The Ark of the
Covenant was made out of shivam wood, overlaid with gold, and
the mercy seat on it. All those are just plain, ordinary
materials. Just exactly like you'd find
shit and wood anywhere else, or gold anywhere else. But the
Ark of the Covenant and all those instruments of worship dedicated
to God's service in the holy place, in the sanctuary, in the
tabernacle, and in the temple, those things were separated from
everything else. never to be used by men in the
ordinary conducting of their lives, but only used for the
worship and service of God. Anyone who used them for any
other purpose brought upon himself the judgment of God. So those
things are separated. You and I, who are gods, have
been separated by God from all of Adam's fallen race by God's
sovereign election, and he has made us holy. Not only that,
but to be holy is to be pure. purified, cleansed, sanctified. I repeat, the words holy and
sanctify or sanctified are the same words. The Lord God declares
to his Israel and to all who stand before him as his covenant
people, you shall be separate, distinct, peculiar, separated
and severed from all others because you are pure. purified by me,
sanctified. We know that that's what those
words mean here because it's borne out by the scripture. Compare
scripture with scripture. Turn over to chapter 20, verse
seven. God says, sanctify yourselves
therefore and be ye holy for I am the Lord your God. Separate
yourselves. cleanse yourselves, go through
the various ceremonies that represented this cleansing of God's free
grace that's ours in Christ Jesus. He says in verse 26 of chapter
20, and ye shall be holy unto me for I am holy and have severed
you from other people that you should be mine. Paul puts it
this way, God hath not called us unto uncleanness but to holiness. How is it that God makes his
people holy? He does so by all his marvelous
works of grace. First, by redemption, by blood
atonement, by the obedience of Christ. So that when our Lord
Jesus had finished his obedience, By his blood, he sanctified all
his people. He made us holy and righteous
before God. I know, folks will tell you,
if you bother to read what folks say, Faulkner confuses justification
and sanctification. Well, I may be confused about
a lot of things, but I got this right. To be holy is to be justified,
and to be holy is to be sanctified. To be holy is to have Christ
made of God unto us, wisdom, righteousness, sanctification,
and redemption. By his obedience to God unto
death, our Lord Jesus put away our sins totally. He obeyed God
for us and brought in everlasting righteous perfectly. And we were
by his obedience sanctified and perfected before God. And then
at the appointed time of love, as I said a moment ago, the Lord
God sends His Spirit and creates in us a new man. Ephesians 4.24
says that new man in you is created in righteousness and true holiness. That new man created in you is
Jesus Christ the Lord. It is that holy thing that's
born of God and cannot sin, as John tells us in 1 John 3. That
new thing created in us is called a new creature. A new creature. Old things are passed away. God's
put away all our sins by the death of his son and all things
are made new so that the man being born of God has a new heart,
a new will, a new nature, a new disposition, new everything. Made new by Christ Jesus the
Lord. And the Lord God will soon make
us holy. The day comes in resurrection
glory when he calls these bodies out of the grave and raises his
people from the dead and we shall awake in the likeness of our
Redeemer. David put it this way in Psalm
17. Then shall I be satisfied, not till then will all my desires
be fulfilled. Not till then will all my hope
be fulfilled. Not till then will all the ambitions
of faith be fulfilled. Then shall I be satisfied when
I awake with thy likeness. This is that holiness which God
performs for us and performs in us by his grace in, by, and
with Christ Jesus the Lord. Now second, This is a call to holiness. Ye shall be holy, for I, the
Lord your God, am holy. Look at verse 37. Therefore,
therefore, because God said you shall be holy, for I, the Lord
your God, am holy, therefore shall ye observe all my statutes
and all my judgments and do them I am the Lord. Here the Lord
God calls you and me to holiness, godliness, righteousness in our
behavior, in every detail of life. In chapter 18, the Lord
God declared to us his claims as God our Savior because of
blood atonement in Christ the Lord. He tells us we're his,
we're his. Lock, stock and barrel, he has
the right to rule over us. And being born of God, we want him to, absolutely. Being born of God, we want him
to rule us absolutely all the time. Gladly we bow to him. Here, God calls us to be a separate,
distinct, peculiar people, severed from all others in our behavior. Hold your hands here and turn
over to 1 Thessalonians 4. I want you to see this. We'll just look at just a few
verses here. Verse one. Furthermore, then, we beseech
you, brethren, and exhort you by the Lord Jesus, that as you
have received Christ Jesus, as you have, I'm sorry, as you have
received of us, you ought to walk and to please God. Walk
and please God. So you would abound more and
more for ye know what commandments we gave you by the Lord Jesus.
For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that
ye should abstain from fornication, that every one of you should
know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honor,
not in the lust of concupiscence, even as the Gentiles, which know
not God, that no man go beyond and defraud his brother in any
matter, because that the Lord is the avenger of all such, as
we also have forewarned and testified. For God hath not called us to
uncleanness, but unto holiness. There are people who vainly imagine
that somehow being saved by grace doesn't have any effect on the
life of a believer. That being saved by God's grace,
it doesn't matter how we behave. We're saved by grace, everything's
all right. Well, the fact is God here calls
us to specific things and commands that we obey him. I know people
say, but pastor, we're not under law. This is the law we're reading.
You've heard your pastor. Well, that's exactly right. But
for the believer, God's law is not expressed in Ten Commandments
alone. God's law is expressed in the
whole revelation of his will in the entirety of this book. So that our lives are governed
and ruled not by the laws and rules of men, not by the creeds
of Christianity, not by the rules of a church, not by religious
covenants, but rather by the Word of God and the Word of God
alone. You and I, as believers, have
no right to impose upon anyone anything that's not written in
the Word of God. We as a body of believers have
no right to expect or to impose upon anyone anything that's not
plainly written in the Word of God. I don't attempt to make
rules and regulations by which you are to live and things you're
supposed to do and check them off and now you'll be good. And
I don't check up to see how you're doing things. That's none of
my business. It is my business to show you
what God requires. And the things required of God
in Leviticus 19 are just as authoritative and just as much required of
God as Romans chapter 9. They're just as meaningful to
you and me in our lives today as the ninth chapter of Romans
is. So let's look and see what the Lord God requires. Here he
specifically tells us how we're to live in this world and thus
honor him. how we're to live in holiness,
to possess our vessels in honor. We please God by faith in Christ. I'm fully aware of that. Do you
understand? Without faith, it's impossible
to please him. And yet we must never imagine
that it doesn't matter how we live. We read in 1 Thessalonians
4.1 that we must take care as to how we ought to walk and to
please God. Whether therefore you eat or
drink or whatsoever you do, do all to the glory of God. I've told you many times what
I used to tell our daughter every time she left the house, don't forget who you are and
whose you are. No matter where you go tomorrow,
my brother, my sister, no matter what you do tomorrow, no matter
who you meet, no matter what you face, no matter what your
circumstances, don't forget who you are and whose you are. The
name of Christ is on you. And what you say and what you
do and the way you behave in your home, in your shop, in the
store, in your business reflects good or bad on the name of God
our Savior. You say, Pastor, that's a heavy
monkey on your back. It's not so heavy. Oh no, what
a blessed, blessed weight to carry on our hearts. I belong
to God, I ought to act like it. You belong to God, you ought
to act like it. Let me show you from these 37
verses, 13 plain statements. I'll be very, very brief in each
of them. But if you're interested in living
for God's honor, If you want to know exactly how to do so,
understand what God says. If you would live in this world
for the glory of God, we must give honor to whom honor is due. Verse three, ye shall fear every
man, his mother and his father, and keep my Sabbaths. I am the
Lord your God. We say charity begins at home.
And we need to learn that reverence, respect, and honor begins at
home. Desperately, this generation
needs to learn this. Children are to honor their parents. That means obey them, yes. But
there's more than just the honor of obedience. Honor is on the
inside. It shows itself on the outside.
If children honor their parents, they honor them by obeying them,
but they honor them in their behavior because they honor them
inwardly, not just because they're afraid of them. That's not the
kind of honor it's talking about. It's talking about an honor that
arises from within. Men and women honor your parents,
but parents, if they're truly parents, are more than what's
commonly termed in our day your biological mother or father.
Dogs can do that as well as anybody else. Parents are those men and
women, that man, that woman, who nurtures you and raises you
and cares for you and trains you and raises you up in the
knowledge of Christ our Lord. How blessed of God are those
children who have parents who nurture them and train them with
care and raise them in the nurture and admonition of the Lord, nurturing
them in the knowledge of Christ. But the command here extends
beyond parents. It extends to all divinely appointed
authority. Look at verse 32. Thou shalt
rise up before the hoary head and honor the face of old men
and fear thy God, I am the Lord. Show a little respect for your
superiors in age and experience. Young adults need to learn that
as well as children. And as you grow a little older,
you need to continue learning. Show some respect for age and
experience, especially in proven faithful men and women. Number
two, in verses three through eight, if we would live in this
world for the honor of God, we must worship him. Now here, the
Lord deals with outward things. True worship is essentially inward,
heart worship. But where there is heart worship,
there's also public worship. Look at verse three. Ye shall
fear every man his mother and his father, and keep my Sabbaths. I am the Lord your God. Turn
ye not unto idols, nor make to yourselves molten gods. I am
the Lord your God. And if you offer sacrifice of
peace offerings unto the Lord, you shall offer it at your own
will. It shall be eaten the same day
you offer it, and on the morrow, and if aught remain until the
third day, it shall be burnt in the fire. And if it be eaten
at all on the third day, it is abominable. It shall not be accepted. Therefore, everyone that eateth
it shall bear his iniquity because he hath profaned the hallowed,
that is the holy, the sanctified thing of the Lord. And that soul
shall be cut off from among his people. Now, verse three begins
telling us in worshiping God, keep my Sabbaths. We don't have
a Sabbath day to keep in our day. I'm fully aware of that.
Christ is our Sabbath. We rest in Christ by faith. But
here he's talking to us about public worship. He calls for
his people to come and worship him. To come together and worship
him. Understand me. We must never
neglect the worship of God in his house. Neglect not the assembling
of yourselves together as the manner of some is What a privilege What a blessing of God What an
honor God's given us to give us a place where we could assemble
together with his people in the name of our Redeemer and worship
him a place of where God has promised to meet with his own. I urge you, my brothers and sisters,
don't take that lightly. What a privilege. Neglect not
the assembling of yourselves together as the manner of some
is. In verse four, the Lord tells us to worship him alone as God
and not be turned aside to idols. Don't take in or be taken in
by the religious tomfoolery around you, the idolatry around you.
Don't make for yourself any molten image. Don't make any God for
yourself. And don't cherish anything with overmuch love and overmuch
care, anything or anyone. but rather set your affection
on things above. Where your life is hid with Christ
in God, set your affection on things above on Christ Jesus
the Lord. Verse five demands that we worship
God, but there's something else here. He says, If you offer sacrifice
of peace offerings unto the Lord, now He commands you to do it.
He commands you to do it. You shall offer it at your own
will. What strange language. God only accepts and God is only
honored by willing worship, willing service, willing sacrifice. I have said from this pulpit
many times, and I say to you, while I press as firmly, as plainly,
as fully as I possibly can, the blessedness, the importance of
gathering God's people and worshiping Him. If you don't want to come,
don't come. Offering plates of pasta on Sunday
morning, don't want to give, don't give. You pass by the offering
boxes, you don't wanna put anything in? Don't put anything in. I
don't want it, I don't need it, God won't have it. It's accepted
if a man have a willing heart. And without a willing heart,
everything that shows up outwardly is meaningless and an abomination. Our worship of God must be with
a willing heart, but it must be according to God's word. so
that all our ordinances of worship must be performed as God prescribes
them, and they must be observed in the order that God requires
in his word. He said, you bring a willing
sacrifice, you bring your peace offering, and you eat it the
day you bring it, and the second day, on the third day, don't
eat a bite of it. Well, what's wrong with eating
the third day? I had a hot dog today for lunch that, let's see,
we got it over Sam's hot dog stand four days ago. Been in
the refrigerator all this time, been waiting to get it, been
waiting to get it. Oh, it was good. But not this
sacrifice. This sacrifice, God says you
eat the first day, second day, third day, if you eat it, you're
damned. Everything in God's worship,
everything in God's service must be done as God prescribes in
his word. That's the reason we observe
the Lord's table as we do. That's the reason we observe
baptism as a burial of believers confessing Christ Jesus the Lord
as we do. That's the reason we maintain
worship in simplicity as we do. Number three, If we would honor
God while we make our way through this world, we must avoid covetousness
and greed and ever care for the poor and the stranger. Verse 9, when you reap the harvest
of your land, thou shalt not wholly reap the corners of thy
field, neither shalt thou gather the gleanings of thy harvest,
And thou shalt not glean thy vineyard, neither shalt thou
gather every grape of thy vineyard. Thou shalt leave them for the
poor and the stranger. I am the Lord your God. In other words, the Lord reminds
us, we don't own anything. Your house isn't yours. Your
car is not yours. Your farm is not yours. Your
time is not yours. We are stewards of God. Into whose hands God has put
talents and abilities and means. He put it in our hands and he
said, now use this for me. Use this for me. It's not yours. It doesn't belong to your family.
It belongs to God. We're just his stewards. In a
word, we ought to constantly go out of our way to be kind,
generous, thoughtful, and caring, especially to those who are most
likely to be neglected and abused. Look at verse 33. If a stranger
sojourned with thee in your land, ye shall not vex him. Don't give
him a hard time. But the stranger that dwelleth
with you shall be unto you as one born among you. Treat him
like your brother. Treat him like your first cousin. Thou
shalt love him as thyself, because you were strangers in the land
of Egypt. I'm the Lord your God. Every
needy soul ought to remind us that when we were strangers in
need, our God provided us with handfuls of purpose, sustained
us in life, by which he graciously brought us to our mighty Boaz.
And it is our business to use what God puts in our hands, scattering
handfuls to needy poor sinners that they might be brought to
Christ our mighty Boaz. Number four, living for God's
glory means living in honesty, dealing with people in honesty.
Verse 11. You shall not steal, neither
deal falsely, neither lie one to another. Verse 13. Thou shalt
not defraud thy neighbor, neither rob him. The wages of him that
is hired shall not abide with thee all night until the morning.
Verse 35. Ye shall do no unrighteousness
in judgment. in meteored, in weight, or in
measure, just balances, just weights, a just ephah, and a
just tian shall you have. I am the Lord your God, which
brought you out of the land of Egypt." God's grace comes to
sinners through, with, and by Christ Jesus by just weights
and just balances. He deals with us in justice.
in all things. He gives us his grace because
his justice has been fully satisfied by our Redeemer. You and I are
to deal with people in justice. I don't mean by that deal with
them in justice as law deals with a criminal injustice. I
mean by that deal with them justly and honestly. Deal with folks
in uprightness so that Your word is all anybody needs. You and
me and Rex have been in business, you didn't dare take a man at
his word for anything. It's just foolish to do it. Oh,
what a sad commentary on society. What a sad commentary. If I tell
you something, you ought to be able to rest your life on it. And if you tell me something,
I ought to be able to rest my life on it. Deal with folks justly,
honestly, uprightly. Number five, for us, the glory
of our great God involves reverencing his name. Verse 12, you shall
not swear by my name falsely, neither shalt thou profane the
name of thy God, I am the Lord. Don't use God's name lightly. Don't use God's name or the things
of God as a byword. Oh, God teach me when I think
of you to think with reverence. Holy and reverend is his name. Number six, verse 14. Honoring
God means treating men and women with respect and tenderness. rather than with harsh beastly
cruelty, so naturally common to the wicked and the ungodly
and to our proud hearts. Verse 14. Thou shalt not curse the deaf,
nor put a stumbling block before the blind, but shalt fear thy
God, I am the Lord. Now, when I read that, it seems
to me that's the kind of instruction that you would expect to be given
to a child in a nursery primary, wouldn't you? Don't poke fun
at children. Don't poke fun at folks who are
blind. Don't poke fun at folks who are
poor. But God says this to you and me, full grown up men and
women. He said, I know your base, depraved
and cruel by nature. So don't build a dam before men,
and don't dig a pit before men, and don't mock people. Don't
set yourselves up as superior to others. Don't curse or get
upset with a person because he's blind and can't see, because
he's deaf and can't hear. You were too. Don't put a stumbling block before
your neighbor, before any sinner and the savior. Oh, how guilty, how guilty we've
been with family and friend and foe. Don't do it, don't do it. There's one preacher I don't
pay much attention to, don't listen to him much. I read something
from him years, years ago. He said, Don't fuss with folks
about things that don't matter. And don't make enemies and drive
a wedge between folks that don't matter. Things that don't matter.
Politics or anything else, just don't do it. They might be your
brethren. They might be your sisters. Treat
them like it. Treat them like it. Number seven. We must learn to bridle like
tongues. Verse 16. Thou shalt not go up
and down as a tailbearer among thy people. Neither shalt thou
stand against the blood of thy neighbor. I am the Lord. Tailbearers,
gossipers, slanderers, backbiters, those are ungodly people. They're just ungodly. There's
no such thing as gossip that doesn't matter. No such thing
as slander that's indifferent. No such thing as bearing false
witness that's to be taken lightly against somebody else. Somebody starts to say something
to me, to slander another, I stop them. I just stop them. I get a lot of email, folks,
right to slander somebody. As soon as I realize the direction
of it, I delete it, don't read it. Just don't read it. I don't
need to hear it. Bill, when gossip comes into
your ear, let your ear be the grave. Don't let it go anywhere
else. Gossip's wicked. It's evil. It's divisive. Tail-bearing,
slandering. Even when you're telling something
evil about somebody, and you know it's true, and everybody
knows it's true, what good does it do? None at all. Leave it
alone. Leave it alone. Number eight,
verses 17, 18, and 19. Love our neighbors. That's what
God requires. Thou shalt not hate thy brother
in thine heart. Thou shalt in any wise rebuke
thy neighbor and not suffer sin upon him. Thou shalt not avenge
nor bear any grudge against the children of thy people. But thou
shalt love thy neighbor as thyself. I am the Lord. The Lord's telling
us here to rebuke our brother's sin by Refusing to let his sin
affect our relationship to him. Whoo. What a command. What a command. Don't retaliate,
don't revenge. Now listen to me. I know, Lindsay,
I'm talking to you, a man just like myself. And our first response to any evil done. That's our
first response. That's our first response. Don't
do it. Don't act in vengeance for yourself. Don't let the offense of another
interfere with how you behave toward him in goodness and mercy. If you bear a grudge for an evil
done to you, You're party to the evil. Leave it alone. Just leave it alone. And seek God's honor. Number
nine, I gotta hurt. Verse 19. For the honor of God,
you and I must distinguish things that differ. You shall not keep
my statutes. I'm sorry, you shall keep my
statutes. Thou shalt not let thy cattle gender with a diverse
kind. Do you reckon that's because
God cared whether you mixed black angus with white charlays? I
doubt it. I doubt it. What's he talking
about there? He's talking about something spiritual. Thou shalt
not sow thy field with mingled seed. Don't plant early sunblow
and golden cross bantam and Iowa chief all in the same field.
That's all right. That's not a matter of concern
to God. He's talking about something spiritual. Neither shalt thou
Shall a garment mingled of linen and wool or woolen come upon
you? Don't wear wool and linen at
the same time. Oh, that's terribly evil. That's
not what he's talking about. He's talking about things spiritual.
We must seek grace from God by his word. through the instruction
given by his word, as we seek to worship him, to distinguish
between grace and works, between the work of man and the work
of God. We cannot worship God wearing
both righteousness of our own making, linen garments, and wool
of God's making, garments of grace, mercy, things provided
by God. We must distinguish things that
differ. both in our own persons and in
the matter of doctrine and in the matter of worshiping God
our Savior. We must not mingle the worship
of God with idolatry. Look at verse 20. Living for
God's honor means we confess our sin and find forgiveness
only by Christ and his atoning blood. Whosoever lieth carnally
with a woman that is a bondmaid, betrothed to a husband, and not
at all redeemed, nor freedom given her, she shall be scourged. They shall not be put to death,
because she was not free. And the Lord, or he shall bring
his trespass offering unto the Lord, unto the door of the tabernacle
of the congregation, even a ram for trespass offering. And the
priest shall make an atonement for him with the ram of the trespass
offering before the Lord for his sin which he hath done. And
the sin which he hath done shall be forgiven him." If we confess
our sin, he's faithful and just to forgive us our sin and to
cleanse us from all unrighteousness. In all these commands, God brings
one thing after another, one thing after another. And then
it comes to sensual, vile behavior. And he said, bring your offering,
and you're forgiven. Bring Christ, confess your sin,
forgiveness is yours. The blood of Jesus Christ, God's
son, cleanseth us from all sin. Number 11. Living for God means that His
honor, His will, takes priority over everything else. Verse 23,
when you shall come into the land and shall have planted all
manner of trees for food, then you shall count the fruit thereof
as uncircumcised. Three years shall it be as uncircumcised
unto you. It shall not be eaten. But the
fourth year, all the fruit thereof shall be wholly sanctified to
praise the Lord with all. And then the fifth year, verse
25, you shall eat it. You shall eat the fruit thereof,
that it may yield unto you the increase thereof. I am the Lord
your God. You shall not eat anything with
blood, and neither shall you use enchantment, nor observe
times. You come, God gives you the land,
and you leave it alone. You leave it alone next year.
Well, man, there's corn growing there. That fellow left there,
he left a good stand of corn. Leave it alone. Leave it alone
the third year. Fourth year, it belongs to God.
Fifth year, you can have whatever you want to. Everything subject
to God's will. not your reason. Everything subject
to God's honor, not your logic. Everything subject to God's Word,
not your feelings. Number 12, if we would honor
God, we must give no approval to and studiously avoid the practices
of idolatry and superstition. The Lord said in verse 26, Don't
use enchantments. That's the enchantments of witches
and wizards and superstition. And don't observe times. I know
I'll get in trouble for this, but I know a lot of folks who
plant their garden by the almanac, by the sign of the moon, don't
do it. Just don't, well it works, I don't care if it works, you
don't do it. We don't use enchantments, we don't observe times, we worship
God. We worship God. Look at verse
26, he goes on with that same thing. You shall not eat anything
with blood, neither shall you use enchantments nor observe
times. You shall not round the corners of your heads, neither
shalt thou mar the corners of thy beard. If you drive down
the road a few miles, you'll find fellows who won't cut the
corners of their beard, they wear their hair a certain way
because they got this law from God. This is not what it's talking
about. Let's talk about religious practices of idolaters who cut
their hair and shave their beards in a certain way to identify
them as worshipers of a God. You shall not make any cuttings
in your flesh for the dead. Barbarians, idolaters, act like
barbarians and idolaters when they bury somebody. They scream
and cut themselves. Don't do it. Don't tattoo yourself
for them, nor print marks upon you. I am the Lord. I am the
Lord. I don't even suggest that God
hear commands that folks don't use tattoos. I suggest you don't. It's kind of dumb. It's just
kind of dumb. But that's not what he's saying
here. He's talking about acts of idolatry. All these things
were pagan religious rites. by which barbarian ignorant men
hope to gain strength or good luck or drive away evil spirits. They drink blood and use enchantments
and observe times and shape their hair or their beard, they cut
their flesh, they tattoo themselves. In a word, God says, don't act
like the heathen. Don't act like the heathen. Look
at verse 31. Regard not them that have familiar
spirits, Neither seek after wizards to be defiled by them. I'm the
Lord. Don't regard the witchcraft around
us, and it's everywhere, the superstition around us, or the
religious idolatry around us. Don't seek to understand it,
just don't. I saw in the news earlier this
morning, there's some kind of movie coming out soon about the
fellow who's supposed to have been dead for 40 minutes, and
then the preachers got together and prayed, and he was resurrected. So I looked up to see who the
preacher was, and he was just what I thought he was. And what are you gonna
do about the movie? Nothing. You can go sit. No,
I'm not interested. Aren't you interested in their
explanation? I don't care what reason they give. I don't care how they
identify things. I didn't go see Jesus Christ
Superstar either. I wasn't interested in what folks had to say. Not
interested. Don't pay any attention to stupidity that's idolatry. Don't do it. Don't you believe
God could do that? God could pull a fella up by
pulling him down if he wanted to. But what men call God's work,
and what God calls the work of Satan and of devils and of wizards
are two different things. Here's the last thing. If we
would honor our God, we must train our children to worship
and serve him. Oh God, teach me. Teach me, even
at this age, teach me this. Do not prostitute thy daughter
to cause her to be a whore. That's not talking about serving
as her pimp. It's talking about religious
activity. Don't sell her off as a prostitute
to Baal, lest the land fall to hoard him, and the land become
full of wickedness. Pastor, that takes in a ton. How can you expect anybody so
to live? God gives us a motive. What a
blessed, blessed motive it is. He says, for I am the Lord your
God. Let us therefore glorify God
in our bodies and in our spirits, which are His, and walk worthy
of the Lord to all pleasing. being fruitful in every good
work, and increasing in the knowledge of God. He made us holy. He sanctified us. Let us therefore
walk before Him, sanctifying ourselves in this sense, continually
with determination, setting ourselves apart to Him. Give me just a
minute longer. Brother Lindsey was talking to
me before anybody else got here Sunday night about learning something
about the responsibility and the work of preaching, speaking
to men for God. I seek by God's grace more today,
more earnestly today, than I did when first I started doing this
work, to separate myself to this work. to the work of preaching
the gospel of God's grace. And I ask God day by day, every
day, for grace, more earnestly now than when I was 17 years
old, to set myself apart to Him. His will, His honor, His name,
His cause. That's called holiness, sanctification,
walking with God. Oh God, give us grace to do what
He here requires with willing heart every day, amen.