Amen. If you have an outline,
we are working through the historical narrative given by the Apostle
Paul in Acts 13. And a couple of weeks ago, we
left off in Acts chapter 13 at the portion of scripture where the
Apostle addressed the call of King Saul, which is given to
us over in verse 21. where it says, and afterwards
they desired a king and God gave unto them Saul the son of Kish,
a man of the tribe of Benjamin by the space of 40 years. And then it says in verse 22,
and when he had removed him, and that's where we took a pause
and we began to work through the theological implications
of that last line. which if a person doesn't know
the historical narrative and doesn't understand the whole
idea and concept of dynasties, you might think that this is
a natural statement and he removed him. But what we learned was
is that God actually killed King Saul. Because with dynasties,
the only way you are removed is by natural death. And in reality,
you're not removed, you're replaced by your prodigy. When the king
dies, his son takes over. And when he dies, his son takes
over. And you and I know the three major models of the scriptures
when it comes to covenant, father, son, king, servant, husband,
wife. And so because we are in the
monarchical period in the book of Acts chapter 13, 21, that
monarchical period circumscribes a period where fathers died and
then sons took over for them and often there were what we
call co-regencies where the son and the father reigned simultaneously
until the father passed of a natural death and then the son would
take over. There were often coups that took place, as you know,
in the monarchical theocratic kingdom of Israel, as is the
case today in governments where kingdoms were established by
the power of blood and sword and murder and death. And so
there was not that kind of allegiance forged between the dynasty and
the people where the people loved the monarchy and loved the king
and loved the king's sons. which is a larger picture of
the way the church is supposed to work with God. God the Father
is the Theomonarch of the universe. God the Father is the Theomonarch. And his son, Jesus Christ reigns
as co-regent king with him over all things to the church. And the church is to love that
model. This is why we call Jesus Lord. Where that concept evades
us, is because we don't understand that what you and I are under
fundamentally in the church is a theomonarchy. A monarchy where
God rules as king and Christ rules with his father as co-regent
and we are the servants in the kingdom, but we are also the
bride of the son. And that paradigm is the last
expression of the kingdom of God before the state of glory
enters in. So when we are in the book of
1 Kings and 2 Kings, 1st Chronicles, 2nd Chronicles, and 1st Samuel,
2nd Samuel, we are in that monarchical paradigm. Last week, we left
off with King Saul going to the Witch of Endor. I want to go
back and read that text, and we're going to develop that a
little bit more just to answer a few questions to make sure
that we cover our basis around that. There were a number of
people who raised certain questions. This is at the end of 1st Samuel,
if you'll go there. And we want to just make sure
that we touch on that before we go back and God Removed him
that is he removed Saul but he had removed Saul because Saul
had operated in a continual state of rebellion he was one of the
model Kings that you and I would not want to take after and so
we discovered this in the book of 1st Samuel where he is pursuing
the witch of Endor in chapter 28. Now I want to read verses
1 through verse 10 here and then we'll deal with our point because
there's a couple of points within the framework of these 10 verses
that you and I want to consider. It came to pass, this is 1st
Samuel 28 1, it came to pass in those days that the Philistines
gathered their armies together for warfare to fight with Israel
and Achish or Achish said unto David, know thou assuredly that
thou shalt go out with me to battle thou and thy men. At this
time David had made an allegiance with the Philistines. And David
said to Achish, surely thou shalt know what thy servant can do.
And Achish said to David, therefore will I make thee keeper of mine
head forever. Now Samuel, and this is a very
important point we're going to develop here in a moment, was
dead. And all Israel had lamented him. and buried him in Ramah,
even in his own city. And Saul had put away those that
had familiar spirits and the wizards out of the land. And
the Philistines gathered themselves together and came and pitched
in Shunem. And Saul gathered all Israel
together and they pitched in Gilboa. And when Saul saw the
host of the Philistines, he was afraid and his heart greatly
trembled. And when Saul inquired of the
Lord, the Lord answered him not, neither by dreams, nor by Urim,
nor by prophets. Then said Saul unto his servants,
seek me a woman that hath the familiar spirit, that I may go
to her and inquire of her. And his servants said unto him,
behold, there's a woman that hath the familiar spirit at Endor.
And Saul disguised himself and put on other raiment, and he
went in two men with him, and they came to the woman by night.
And he said, I pray thee, divine unto me by the familiar spirit,
and bring me him up, whom I shall name unto thee. The woman said
unto him, behold, thou knowest what Saul has done, how he hath
cut off those that have familiar spirits and the wizards out of
the land. Wherefore, then, layest thou
a snare for my life to cause me to die. And Saul swore to
her by the Lord. There you go, that's religious
folk for you. Saying, as the Lord liveth, there
shall no punishment happen to thee for this thing. Then said
the woman, whom shall I bring up unto thee? And he said, bring
me up Samuel, Samuel. And when the woman saw Samuel,
she cried with a loud voice. And the woman spake to Saul saying,
why, have you deceived me for you are Saul? And the king said
unto her, be not afraid for what sawest thou? And the woman said
unto Saul, I saw gods ascending out of the earth. And he said
unto her, what form is he of? And she said, an old man cometh
up, and he's covered with the mantle. And Saul perceived that
it was Samuel, and he stooped with his face to the ground and
bowed himself. And Samuel said, to Saul, why
has thou disquieted me to bring me up? And Saul answered, I am
sore distressed for the Philistines make war against me, and God
has departed from me and answers me no more, neither by prophet
nor by dream. Therefore, I have called thee
that thou mayest make known unto me what I shall do. Then said
Samuel, wherefore then dost thou ask of me, seeing the Lord has
departed from thee and has become thine enemy? And the Lord hath
done to him as he spake by me for the Lord hath rent the kingdom
out of thine hand and given it to thy neighbor even to David
because thou obeyed not the voice of the Lord nor executed his
fierce wrath upon Imalek therefore hath the Lord done this thing
unto thee this day moreover the Lord will also deliver Israel
with thee into the hand of the Philistines and tomorrow shalt
thou and thy sons be with me The Lord also shall deliver the
host of Israel into the hand of the Philistines. Then Saul
fell straight way along, all along the earth and was sore
afraid because of the word of Samuel. And there was no strength
in him for he had eaten no bread at all, nor all night. And the
woman said unto Saul, and the woman came unto Saul and saw
that he was sore troubled and said unto him, behold, thine
handmaid hath obeyed thy voice and I have put my life in your
hand. and have hearkened unto thy words which thou spake unto
me. Therefore I pray, hearken thou also unto the voice of your
handmaid, and let me set a morsel of bread before thee, and eat,
that thou mayest have strength when you go on your way. But
he refused and said, I will not eat. But his servants together
with the woman compelled him, and he hearkened unto their voice.
So he arose from the earth and sat upon the bed. And the woman
had a fat calf in the house, and she hastened and killed it.
took flour, kneaded it, and did bake unleavened bread thereof.
And she brought it before Saul and before his servants. And
they did eat. Then they rose up and went their
way. Thus is the reading of God's
word. Point number five in your outline and in our PowerPoint,
the witch of Endor, a demonic delusion. The Witch of Endor,
Demonic Delusion. So that's an interpretation I'm
rendering on that text. Just because I render that interpretation,
I still have the burden of proof to make it so. Because it's not
so obvious that what we are dealing with is a demonic delusion unless
everyone is concretely clear as to what the Bible prescribes
and prohibits in the area of talking to the dead or engaging
with the dead. And there are theologians on
both sides of the argument. So we're taking our time tonight,
and I'm just going to share with you what I have always taught
around these matters because of their important implication
in your life and mine. I say that what Saul is dealing
with is a demonic delusion, first and foremost, because he was
prohibited by the law of God from seeking familiar spirits
to talk to in the first place. He was prohibited. And then the
text is also telling us plainly that Saul is seeking a witch
in order to conjure up a familiar spirit. Now the idea of a familiar
spirit is a spirit or an entity that ostensibly you or your family
members or relatives would know. And so God talks about this in
the book of Deuteronomy chapter 18, Verse 10 through 13, let's
look at that briefly before we come back so that you can understand
God's position on this, because Christians don't get this today,
and pagans certainly don't get it. And our culture frequently
lauds and celebrates people who can conjure up and call up familiar
spirits. You guys do know that, right?
they celebrate this. But this is precisely what God
had told Israel you are not to do when you enter into the land.
Apparently people do have the ability to contact what they
call the dead. And this enters into a very,
very serious discussion as to do you hold to a biblical worldview
or do you hold to a pagan worldview or do you hold to a little of
both? And so I know a lot of people
who hold to a little of both. They hold to a little Bible and
a little paganism. So we would call it paganism.
OK. And so the challenge always is,
are Christians committed to God's word and therefore sincerely
pursuing a knowledge of God to understand what are the prohibitions
and boundaries of their pursuit of knowing spiritual things or
do they just cross lines, cross boundaries, break through hedges
and overcome limitations and warnings that scripture gives
them and therefore are subject to the consequences that fall
out from crossing those boundaries. You guys understand that last
line? So Solomon said it in the book of Ecclesiastes, whosoever
breaks the hedge will be bitten by the serpent. You need to know
that. He's using an agricultural analogy
of playing in the bushes where snakes live. You break through
those bushes because you are indiscriminate careless or maybe
presumptuous, and then you get bitten by the serpent because
you broke through those boundaries. The word of God warns us consistently
about boundaries that we should not cross over our breakthrough,
our press through, in order to have our curiosities satisfied. In the land of Canaan, which
is where we are in our present culture, we are in a neo-Canaanite
culture. And I've been teaching this for
decades. Our land is a pagan land that celebrates largely
most of what you see prohibited in the book of the Old Testament.
Those principles that are in the Old Testament that God says,
my people are not to be identified with them are largely celebrated
in America today as something that is worthy of veneration
And these are the pagan practices of many of our native countries.
If you come from countries that are pagan in nature, you know,
they conjure up the dead, you know, they talk to spirits, and
you know, they talk to entities. And I use the term spirits and
entities, because the scriptures clearly imply that what they
are dealing with is demonism. So the idea that you are talking
to a loved one, as folks would call it, that loved one, according
to the scripture, is a deception that you are dealing with. And
so we will work through that a little bit tonight as to how
are we to understand and handle what people often are confronted
with, are struggled with, are challenged with, and in some
cases, in a state of disobedience, Volitional disobedience and in
other cases it's imposed upon you because of the disobedience
of your parents Okay, so we don't in grace. We don't teach generational
curses You know how some churches teach generational curses That
too comes out of paganism That is rooted in paganism. It is
not a biblical concept But see, because we are so comfortable
with our native pagan experiences, we adopt that terminology and
bring it over into Christianity indiscriminately. The Bible will
talk about the iniquities of the parents being passed upon
the children, but that's different than curses being passed from
one generation to the next. Do you guys understand what I
just stated? That does not change the difficult task of dealing
with empirical experiences that people have that are tangible
and actual for them on a natural level. People do have experiences. People do see things. People
do hear things. They are not, in all cases, hallucinating. But here's what God says in Deuteronomy
18.10. There shall not be found among
you anyone that maketh his son to pass through the fire. This was a practice of giving
up your children to Moloch and the fire of worshiping this brazen
idol where they were just consumed. This corresponds to abortion
today. That first line is your abortion
practice today, whether you want to accept it or not. When you
offer your babies up in abortions, you are offering them up to Moloch.
There's a complete worldview behind abortions, and it is demonic
in nature. for some of you who are privy
to what's been going on in the news with the exposure of these
cold-hearted, callous leaders in the Planned Parenthood movement
who can take body parts while eating salad and hamburgers,
talk about them, slicing up the body parts and selling them to
make money. All of that is demonic in nature. This is precisely
right. And so when folks who profess
to be Christians give themselves over to these kinds of practices,
you are a practicing pagan. I've been saying it for decades,
a practicing pagan. Your worldview is not biblical. The idea that you think you can
just go have an abortion, that is what you are doing. There
shall not be found among any of you that make his son to pass
or his daughter to pass through the fire or that use divination. Divination, what is that? This
is the process that he's about to unfold with these folks who
do tarot cards and Ouija boards and crystal balls and conjure
up people. That's the whole panorama. That's
the whole plethora of divination. Divination is when you make contact
with entities for the purpose of getting information. Generally,
people that are engaged in those practices want to know something
that they couldn't know otherwise. They're very curious, as is the
case with King Saul. Saul is curious, is he not? He
wants to know something. And you and I are going to be
able to see in the context that what he is wanting to know he
is forbidden to know because he broke down all of the lines
of communication several chapters before with God and destroyed
any authentic revelation that would be given to him as to what
he should do. So he finds himself in a situation
after he has cut off all of the legitimate revelation from God
now going to the very witches that he had cut off in time past
because the text has stated that Saul had put away the familiar
spirits, right? Remember that? He had put away
familiar spirits and those who were engaged in what Deuteronomy
18.10 says. It's one thing to put them away. It's another thing
to just store them away with the objective of going back to
him later. And this then becomes a principle also in the area
of your walk with God. When you're playing with things,
you know, you shouldn't be playing with it rather than really demolishing
that thing. You just preserve it over in
the corner so that in tough times you go back to it. When God does
not speak to you, it says, an observer of times or an enchanter
or a what? Witch. That's Deuteronomy 18.10. And so Saul is violating God's
law in that regards the healthy church or the healthy kingdom
rids itself of all of these alternative mediums. So the land of Israel,
Canaan, the land of Canaan was a type of the church at large.
And when God had brought Israel into the land, his job was to
clean the land. purged the land of all of these
pagan practices, so that the children of Israel only had one
place they could go for revelation, and that was to God. But see,
when you got all of these convenient stores you can go to for revelation,
you can quickly dismiss God if God's not saying what you want
Him to hear. And this is why in our present church today we've
got a mess going on with people who privately practice these
things. and still come to church. This is going on all around the
world. Been in the church for the longest. The Catholic church
never ever purged itself of it from the beginning of the whole
Catholic movement. It basically whitewashed pagan
practices and brought it right into what we call syncretism,
right into the church so that people were commonly engaging
in prayers, not only just conjuring up familiar spirits, but praying
to loved ones and relatives and saints and this, that, and the
other thing. It was completely harmonious and accepted in the
Catholic religion. Now, when you do that, when you
open yourself up to that whole world, you have no possible way,
none, to know the truth. You have no way. Because you
have removed the lines of demarcation between authentic biblical revelation
in the whole world of demonism. And the world of demonism is
a vastly deceptive system that you don't have any capacity to
detect by your own senses. When once you open yourself up
to that model of revelation, there's no way you can say that's
of God and that's not. It's not possible. It's not possible
for you to say that's a good angel, that's a bad angel. It's
not possible. The scriptures are clear that
Satan who is called the devil, that old serpent, the dragon
deceives the whole world. He deceives the whole world so
successfully that the world believes that those things are real and
right and legitimate. And what that fundamentally means
is the magic that he works, the deception that he works, to be
talking about this a little bit more on Sunday when we explain
why only God's elect will not fall prey to the great apostasy. But the deception that he works
is so massive that Jesus said the only way that people would
not be taken in by it is if they are God's elect. That's Matthew
24. That's Mark chapter 13. That
the lying signs and wonders that he imposes on humanity are so
magnificent that it's impossible with your puny brains and your
limited empirical data and your five senses to be able to authenticate,
affirm, or disprove of what you're experiencing. And this is why
God says to us, don't even play with it. Don't even play with
it. Because you don't have the ability
to control its power and to discern its erroneous objectives in your
life. And so we see it here in this
account where God told Saul not to deal with it as a king and
Israel as a whole. They were supposed to get rid
of them. Look at verse 11. Let me see what verse 11 says and
then we'll go on. I'll show you something else.
Or a charmer or a consulter with what? Or a wizard or a necromancer. Now what is a necromancer? This
is someone that's definitely engaging with the dead. Okay,
that's what a necromancer is. Now, all of these are actually
engaging with the dead. It's just that those in the realm
of the dead are also fallen angels. And because they are fallen angels,
they are also spiritually dead. They are angelic beings who are
now demons, and they are assigned to death as well. and they are
part of Tartarus, a pit of hell that is not Gehenna and it's
not Hades, it's just a confined place where fallen angels dwell,
but they have from time to time the freedom to continue to wreak
havoc on humankind, all who cross the boundaries of biblical truth
and move into this very, very seductive and powerful world
of demonism. And when you enter into that
world, the only way you're coming out is if God brings you out.
You will not come out on your own. So be warned. If you think you can enter into
that world because your cousin says so, or your uncle says so,
or your brother says so, or your relatives, when you go into that
world, you are there for the duration. You are never coming
out on your own. What that means is if you open
yourself up to that, you have no way of closing the door from
any kind of visitation for the rest of your life. Do you guys hear what I'm saying?
This is how dark it is. This will drive you crazy. So
I deal with cases as a pastor and it's so hard because you
ask people questions and sometimes people are honest. But most people
are liars. They lie even to the pastor.
And it seems funny, but we shouldn't be laughing because pastors who
are legitimate pastors are frontline men, like first responders in
a calamity, in a tragedy. Your emergency people, your fire
department, your police department, your trauma units. That's how
pastors are, because people are going through very serious spiritual
troubles. and they always run to the pastor,
which is right. The problem is when you get there,
if you aren't really thinking about God, you lie to him too. He's trying to help you. And
he's asking you questions like, who you kicking it with? You
smoking weed? You doing dope? You taking anything
that's gonna be a gateway into that world? Because we can show
you the gates. Are you entering into those gates?
Are you watching things that are opening your mind up to that
whole world? No, no, I ain't did nothing pastor.
Okay. Okay. So you say there are lots of
gates into that world, lots of gates into that world. This is
what we're learning in Psalm one, the no factor that the man
or the woman has who delights themselves in the law of God,
keeps them from all that trouble. Cause they live fundamentally
saying, no, I'm not watching that. I'm not listening to that. I'm not drinking that. I'm not
smoking that. I'm not taking that. Cause I
want to be on a straight line for glory. I don't want to take
a side road. That's going to take me years
to come out of some securities trap. That's going to frazzle
my mind and make me useless for the kingdom of God. which happens
to people who go down those courses. Are you guys hearing me? This
happens a lot. For some reason, people think
that playing with this stuff is more satisfying and gratifying
than knowing the true and the living God by his word. That
makes no sense. It makes no sense. But the kingdom
of God, the true kingdom of God, when a person is in it, is radically
different than the kingdom of darkness. The kingdom of darkness
is designed to trouble you, turn your world upside down, create
continual doubt, fear, anxiety, stress, enhance the torment of
not having a solid walk with God, enhance the torment, expose
you to things that constantly bring about questions in your
mind as to the verity of God and the verity of biblical truth.
The opposite of the kingdom of God is not peace, but torment,
not righteousness, but perpetual temptation to do evil, not joy,
but a constant state of, if not out and out depression, melancholy,
sort of just a drab dab life that does not at all hallmark
a person who knows God and has their mind set on God. And your
mind is where the battle is. Your heart holds the helm or
the volition. It turns the door, your heart
does, turns the door down that path. But it's your mind that
has to go through the warfare of the propositions and the images
and the sounds and the noises and the experience. And it reshapes
your perspective and you lose focus. And now you're bringing
to bear questions that you would have never had to bring to bear
had you never gone down that course. Are you guys hearing
what I'm saying? Lots of people struggle with
what I'm talking about now. Lots of people struggle with
this. Lots of people, I've seen situations where people have
lost their mind frequently, young and old. And they have to go
get medicated and go through therapy. And when they come up
out of those experiences, They have to be trained how not to
go back through those doors. And they have to fight a battle
against hell because hell is knocking at their doors. Do you
understand that? Now, what makes my argument valid,
if you don't know, is that the Bible clearly and explicitly
teaches a demon world. This is the parallel world you
have to acknowledge exists. There's this phony Christianity
that you and I, you know, sometimes are frequented with, are exposed
to in our culture that does not believe in that world. It's a
phony Christianity that really doesn't believe in heaven either.
But it does just fine in this physical dimension that you and
I are in, and they're very pragmatic. They go to church, they pay their
tithes, they give money, whatever. They don't want to know about
heaven, they don't want to know about hell. Well, true believers got to know
about both. They don't want to know about
the Holy Ghost. They don't want to know about demons. But true believers
have to know both exist as a real system and they are hostily opponents,
oppositional to one another. And you and I are the collateral
damage where we waste our time going down these doors. Are you
hearing what I'm saying? So this is where I'm laying a
foundation to kind of help you understand And I'm only going
to be dealing with point number five tonight probably before
we get back and deal with Israel moving out from under the influence
and authority and rule of King Saul. So King Saul is a type
of, I'm going to use a bigger paradigm to make it even more
applicable to you and me. King Saul is a type of a church
age. He's a type of a church age,
an era in which the church is very much given over to and open
to all sorts of revelations. Because as the leaders are, so
are the people. Are you guys hearing me? Our
Bible's clear about that. So when Israel said, let us have
a king like all the other nations, God gave them a king like them.
But he was not a king that God was pleased with. He was not
a king that God was pleased with, but he was exactly the kind of
king that the people themselves were. For they had gone a whorey. But what they experienced under
King Saul was a devastating life of topsy-turvy wars and conflicts,
battles that they lost all the time, and then increasing taxation
because the king was constantly raping them and pillaging them
of their funds. As God said, that would occur
because you do not have a godly leader. It goes on in churches,
goes on in nations. This is a paradigm. Are you guys
following what I'm saying? So Israel did not know peace
in the days of Saul. They did not know peace. Remember,
the Ark of the Covenant had been taken away. That means there
was no central revelation of the glory of God in the person
of Christ in the temple. In fact, it was a tabernacle
at that time. So Israel only had an outward show of religion
But they did not have the typical presence of Jehovah with them.
That's your liberal church today. They got pulpits, they got Bibles,
they got hymns. But Christ is not the central
message. And the Word of God is not taught
in a solid expository form where the leaders take the Word of
God serious and the people take the Word of God serious. They're
just doing church. You guys follow me? That's exactly
what's going on in our account. woven into Saul's debacle of
a life and Israel's debacle of a life, always running from the
Philistines they were. What do the Philistines represent?
The flesh. Remember? The uncircumcised Philistines. Write it down, learn it. You
gotta understand typology. The Philistines are the flesh. The flesh is that dominant entity
that's gonna have its way I told you three entities that we fight
against three signal battles. We fight against the world. We
fight against the devil and we fight against the Philistine.
Do we not? This is what we love about Samson.
When people can understand the gospel, most people miss Samson
altogether, but Samson is a great type of Jesus Christ in that
he slew the Philistines all by himself and deliver Israel from
their captivity to the Philistines. And he is a type of our Lord
Jesus Christ. So was David. Israel will not
know deliverance from the Philistines until David emerges. Right? So in the meanwhile, not only
is the Ark of the Covenant not in Israel because it had been
taken, Israel is losing battle after battle by the Amalekites,
by the Philistines and others. And King Saul now is so desperate
that he's running to the witch. How come? Three reasons I'm going
to share with you right now. This is quite remarkable. I'll
show you. First of all, he's running to the witch because
the prophet is dead. The prophet is dead. That's why
I read all of those verses. Who's the prophet? Samuel's gone. So when the prophet is dead,
you don't have the voice representing God when the prophet is dead. But now you're gonna see that
Saul also killed the priest. And because he killed the priest,
you no longer have the divine revelation that comes through
the priesthood, the Urim and the Thummim. So when Saul says,
God has departed from me, what he's really saying is I departed
from God because the prophet died on me who had access to
God and I killed the priest The only thing that Saul has left
now are the demons. You got to follow that. And that's
a picture of the apostate church, where it denies the gospel in
the prophetic word. It denies the gospel in the centrality
of Jesus Christ as the priest. And all it's left to now is demonism.
Are you guys hearing what I'm saying? It has cut off the prophet. It has cut off the priest. There's
nothing left for a Saul type denomination or church age, but
signs and wonders. Right? That's what we are. So
I'm just trying to help us to understand the importance of
these things. And so now I want to show you what I mean by that.
Go with me and your Bible to first Samuel chapter 22, where
Saul is in pursuit of David. Saul has been pursuing David
for a good 30 years almost throughout the course of his ministry He's
seeking to kill the only thing that is holding the kingdom together
now Saul represents Adam one and Christ represents the last
Adam Saul represents the kingdom of the flesh and Christ represents
The true believer, David represents the true believer and the body
of Christ that is going to always be pursued by the flesh. This
is what we see when Jesus finally appears into the world. He came
unto his own and his own what? Right, because they were fleshly
and carnal. And what's quite interesting
about the continuity of this revelation is that when you follow
Saul, you can follow Saul from what we, his life existed from
1050 BC, and you can follow the first Saul all the way up to
the second Saul of Acts chapter nine. Remember Saul of Tarsus? Was not Saul of Tarsus doing
the very same thing, persecuting Jesus of Nazareth? Are you guys
following me? And Saul of Tarsus was a Benjamite, just like Saul,
the first king. These were warrior men, but they
trusted in their own flesh. And whenever you trust in the
flesh, you're gonna oppose the gospel because the gospel always
demolishes trusting in your flesh. Are you guys hearing me? So from
Saul to Saul, we have this continuity of opposing the kingdom of David.
Now, David did not kill Saul. Because David honored the monarchy. And so David allowed the inevitable
to occur to Saul, which took place over time. But I want you
to see in 1 Samuel 22 what Saul did. He's hunting David down. And we read over in verse 16
of 1 Samuel 22. Are you there? And the king,
that is King Saul, said, you shall surely die. He's speaking
to Abimelech, Ahimelech. a limeleck is the high priest
you shall surely die and what all your father's house he's
trying to kill the whole priesthood now I want you to I want you
to you know I want you to get this now because these are very
serious lessons about the nature of the apostate church this is
not a laughing matter that he wants to kill not only a limeleck
but all his sons What insight we actually have on King Saul
is this. He himself presently is demon controlled. Are you guys hearing me? It has
to be that he's demon controlled. Not only is he going after David,
but he's going after everything that agrees with David. He tried
to even kill his own son, Jonathan. So he goes after the high priest
not knowing that the high priest is the anointed one in the kingdom
of Israel. You don't kill him. The last
person you kill is the priest. This goes to show how much hostility
and antipathy and affront that Saul had to the kingdom of Israel.
He wants to destabilize all of Israel to achieve his own goals.
But the enemy comes but to still kill and what? Right, and to
do it totally and utterly. And the king said unto his footmen
that stood by him, turn and slay, I want you to hear this now,
the priests of the Lord. See it? Slay the priests of the Lord.
Even for that to come out of your mouth, you have to be demon
controlled. So when we used to go through
the monarchy years ago at Grace, I talked about the incongruency
of a political kingdom with the religious kingdom, which is the contention that
the church has experienced for 2000 years, the incongruency
of a political kingdom with a religious kingdom. And we see the debacle
in Israel where they had sought for a king and they got one,
right? Guess what this kingdom does now? This kingdom, rather
than submitting to the spiritual element in Israel, which was
before the monarchy, rather than submitting to the priesthood,
it now must dominate the priesthood. because the political element
is going to ultimately be overcome by demonism. And it's going to
use the power of the sword to enforce its own rules and its
own laws, even to the point of subjugating the church. And this
happens in every generation and it will happen in America too.
What do you mean? The two systems, the church and
the state cannot coexist together equally Forever. At some point, either the church
becomes so prominent that it takes on the state's authority
and brings it up under its rule, subsumes it under its rule as
Catholicism did. And then your state-sanctioned
churches in Europe did the same thing, controlling the power
of the state. But in doing so, now they're
going to implement the law of God with the sword. And in so
doing, you lose the gospel. Are you guys hearing me? You cannot have the church operating
on the beast, which is politics, and the gospel survives. So we have church history affirming
what I'm saying. Wherever the church becomes prominent, it
will then subsume the authority of the state under it and start
telling the state what to do. And now it can threaten the body
politic with legislation and rules and regulations. And if
you don't believe what we teach, you get thrown in prison or lose
your property. That all happened. This is true. This is why when America was
established, It made a hard distinction between polity with the political
institutions and polity with the religious institution. There
shall not be an agreement between the church and state of such
a level that the state now is endorsing the church and the
church now is endorsing the state because the only healthy relationship
that a state can have with the church and a church can have
with the state is a relationship of what I call friendly adversaries. The church has to be free to
be the prophetic voice of God to the state It has to be free
Are you guys hearing what I'm saying? It cannot say we will
take the sword. That's the horror of revelation
17 If God gives you and me too much
power we do the same thing Give any person too much power
as Lord Atkins plainly said power corrupts Right? Absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Particularly when your power is not supposed to be the power
of the sword or politics or legislation, but the power of propositional
truth from the standpoint of a priesthood ministry, where
you are seeking God to change hearts, not legislation. So a lot of times you and I are
seeking to pray and wanting to get involved and get policies
changed. So I'm on the radio every Monday
telling you segregation, integration, none of that works. You can't
get people to love each other just by making them get on the
same bus. Are you guys understanding what
I'm saying? See, and so at the point at which the government
thinks that it can destroy healthy boundaries and force everybody
to live together, it's usurping the job of the church and the
work of the gospel to regenerate hearts, produce love, and cause
people to love one another sincerely. in spite of their differences.
Am I making some sense to you? Are you guys getting this? And
whenever the church rushes to the state, as the conservative
right has done for decades upon decades to get the state to do
what it wants to do, it always will abuse its privileges. Now the liberal progressive left
church is under the auspices of the state right now. That's
right. It's celebrating the power of
the judiciary to change laws and rules and force unity. Do
you guys see that perilous pendulum swing? Who here doesn't understand
what I said? Good. So that's, you got to pay attention
to the world you're in. You got to pay attention to the
world you're in. You remember what I've been saying is we,
we got to, we got to be circumspect, got to know the times, got to
know where we are. So it used to be you had Liberty University
and different powerful religious entities. They would be advocates
at Washington, including Billy Graham and all of his cohorts,
as it were, talking to the presidents and talking to the senators and
telling them what they should be doing. And they got corrupted.
Because politics will always corrupt religion. Cause it makes
promises it cannot fulfill. And the two shouldn't be sleeping
in the same bed. No way. So. The religious right rolled the
hobby horse of self-righteousness and political agendas during
the fifties and the sixties and the seventies. And then it swung
from the religious right to the religious left. Our nutty fruity
churches now are exercising the power of the state to get its
job done. They're jumping up and down all
happy for the changes. This is why I said that the churches
might as well just start throwing up rainbow flags in front of
every church. Just throw up your rainbow flag.
Let everybody know, you know, we're done. We're done with the
Bible. We want Jesus, but we don't want his Bible. Because now they get to utilize
the authority of the state because it's in full agreement with the
trends and the agenda of this secular system. Are you guys
hearing what I'm saying? This is what our churches are
doing because it has no identity in Christ. So now the faithful
church who reads his Bible and understand that these kind of
wins occur is poisoning itself for persecution. And rightly so. Rightly so. You have to become a friendly
adversary over against the state. When the state abandons a biblical
worldview, abandons the true image of God in man, starts propping
up its own ideas, how things exist, the church now has to
be a prophetic voice, ready to suffer against the state. You
guys understand that? Right, so a lot of you who are
new Christians, y'all getting ready to figure this out. Either
you're gonna capitulate on your jobs when they threaten you,
Which even though you have constitutional rights and the Bill of Rights,
you have the freedom of speech, you can say what you want to
say, but you're going to get tested by the power of the beast
now. Now you're going to feel what Christians have felt all
around the world. You're getting ready to feel
what David was feeling all of David's preparatory ministry. All during his preparatory ministry,
he's being hunted down by King Saul. Do you understand how uncomfortable
that must be to have the state against you all the days of your
life? you never did that man one wrong thing and he's hunting
you down like a flea and Killing everyone that even remotely associates
with you I'm making the application because you'll be sleep on me
if I didn't and The king said unto the footman that stood by
turn and slay the priest of the Lord because their hand is also
with whom? May it be so with every one of
us. I May it be so that every true believer who is called to
be a priest, his hand is with David. Are you hearing me? His hand is with the beloved.
You know where you are by your friends and your enemies. If
your enemies are people who are on the Lord's side, you're in
trouble. If your friends are people who are against the Lord,
you are in trouble because they knew when he had fled and did
not show it to me. See that last line? Because they
knew when he had fled and did not show it to me. This gets
into the ethics, too, again, of the lesser of two evils and
being torn between principles. And Christians always like to
try to chop things up into black and white. And that's ridiculous
because things are more complex than that. And one has to be
willing to Operate out of a higher good which will set you up to
be illegal in other areas To be guilty of breaking laws in
other areas. Are you guys hearing me? King Saul is coming after David
They hear that the priests have fed David and his men Which is
what we're supposed to do with all people feed them. The priests
are just doing their job. I And then when the king finds
out that it was David in him, he wants to punish now the priest
for loving on the children of God. Well, he's all jacked up
because the priest didn't say anything. I wouldn't either. Who was it that you fed? Can't
quite remember. Can you give me some time to
think about it? That's a complex question. My
memory has been short over these last few days. If you give me
a little time, I'll answer you. So those are the situations where
the believer is about to be put in a position that when he loves
the right thing and the right person, he's going to die. That's called biblical ethic. Now, if he didn't, if that believer
didn't love David, Oh, it was David, you know, right around
the corner, go get it. You got that better thinking
through these kinds of things enter into our lives from time
to time. Frequently. This is how believers end up
dying because in their love, they cover and then they suffer
for their love and their covering pass out or not. I don't like
that ethic. That's your problem. I'm not going to let a crooked
police department hunt someone down that I love and take him
or her or them just because they have the advantage to. I'm going
to stall them. Fellas, come on in. Let me feed
y'all. Are you guys hearing what I'm saying? This is the ethic
I've built in my own character over many years of understanding
how the legal system is not always moral. And you have to know how
to make a distinction between legality and morality. This is
how we survive, by the way. A Jewish brethren, when they
had the indictments out on them by Hitler, were often saved by
Christians who exercise this very ethic that I'm talking to
you about now, who frequently died for their Jewish friends.
Are you guys hearing me? Just in case you get over righteous.
It's real easy to say what you will do and won't do in terms
of I'm just gonna tell the truth. No, you're not You ain't gonna
tell the truth So let's just take pastor's advice and act
stick it in your back pocket because when it shows up to deliver
you Man, I'm so glad I came to that Friday night Bible class And look at Saul how he lost
his own men But the servants of the king would not put forth
their hand to fall upon the priest of the Lord I love this. This
is what I meant earlier when I said that just because the
government legislates rights and rules and regulations doesn't
mean that it's going to affect or accomplish what they seek
to achieve. And what's happening in America is more division,
not less division. It's more division taking place. Less allegiance to the state
because the state is not using wisdom. Are you guys hearing
me? The state is not using wisdom. Saul did not use wisdom. I'll
show you an interesting thing in relationship to this. We are
in 1 Samuel chapter 22. I want to move over to chapter
23, show you the difference between Saul and David. I'm in chapter 23, verse one,
are you there? Then they told David saying, behold, the Philistines
fight against Keli and they robbed the threshing floor. Therefore,
David did what? inquired of the Lord saying shall
I go and smite these Philistines and the Lord said unto David
what and Smite the Philistines now, how did that happen? How
did David inquire of the Lord? verse 9 and David knew that Saul
secretly practiced what mischief against him and he said to Abbie
a thought the priest bring hither the what ah See what David knew
he knew to go to God through the priesthood Secondly, he knew
that God would speak through that means I taught you this
a couple weeks ago God is first calls, but he uses means and
so what David is not doing David is not Usurping to himself the
kind of authority where he's talking to God directly He's
going through the proper channels to talk with God because he's
honoring the mechanism Saul is actually destroying the mechanism
David is honoring the mechanism and guess what God is doing talking
to David Do you guys see that talking to David? And so it's
very important for us to understand that for us, the mechanism is
the word of God. Don't think God's going to talk
to you through your dreams. And when you walk in, you know,
down the street, Lord, talk to me. Nope. You got a big old book.
He, he loves talking to you out of that big old book. You never
open. And he talks to you through the
preaching of the gospel. When the anointing is taking place,
the spirit of God used the text, lifts the text up and makes application
to everyone in the room. That's how he does it. So on
the day of judgment, he will be just when men and women say,
I didn't know. He'll say, you didn't know you
were in that class. You do know. So we see in first Samuel chapter
28, the demise of King Saul. I want to talk about that a little
bit more. Going back to our PowerPoint so I can work through the three
points. We see a distinction here between
Saul and David. David is calling on the Lord
all throughout this period. David is successful. Why? Because
the Lord is with him. Why? Because David is using the
means that God set up by which God will speak to him. David
is honoring the word. He's honoring the priesthood. He's honoring
the prophet. David is not usurping the authority as the king would
do. Are you guys hearing what I'm
saying? He's not bypassing the mechanism. David is a good Bible-believing
Christian. He doesn't need to have special
access to God. All he needs God to do is speak
through his means. So now Saul, a rebel, given over
to what? Destruction. That's proposition
one. And because of that, God took him out. That's proposition
two. And then he raised up David, the servant son. That's proposition
three. So I'm going to take this next 20 minutes to actually astound
you even more fully. Because all three of those propositions
are valid, and that's exactly what's going on. I'm just sharing
with you the deeper, more acute spiritual conflict and battle
going on behind the scenes. When a man or a woman departs
from the Word of God, when they abandon Scripture as their sole
and exclusive means by which they get concrete revelation
from God, yes or no, on this or that, co-joined with prayer
and the wisdom of true men and women of God who really actually
do know God, not say they know God, but know God, when men and
women abandon that, you are open to delusion. And so God has already
warned through his prophets that they are, that the people of
Israel, the covenant people were not to follow certain courses.
Some of you have been around with me at grace for a good period
of time, and I'm going to take you through what you've heard
before. Very clear, startling intentionality on the part of
God to deceive any man, any woman, any people who does not come
through the front door of humility before God's word. I got an email
a little while ago. I guess somebody had heard me
say something about the fact that God is sovereign over evil,
all evil, all good, all right, all wrong, over everything. And
they had a conniption. Well, they're going to have a
conniption again. In Ezekiel chapter 13, verses
1 through 10, here's what God says. I want you to pull your
Bibles out and look it up because when you leave, I don't want
you to say Pastor Jesse said it. I want you to see it for
yourself. because you have to be able to defend biblical propositions
that are hard of which most people don't accept as part of the identity
and character of God. Like there are people who hold
the false caricature that God only does good. He never does evil. He never
brings evil. God doesn't devise evil. God doesn't bring evil things
on people. God only does good. Like God
does good, the devil does evil. You guys ever heard that? We call that a dichotomy. That's
a false dichotomy. But I'm getting ready to show
you that when God brings evil, he brings evil because we deserve
it. He brings evil because he's just. Evil is a component of God's
justice. This is what the tree of the
knowledge of good and what underscores in the first principle of creation. Now that tree couldn't have gotten
there unless God created it. And so he says to humanity, this
tree, I created this tree and it's here as a just judgment
against all who rebel against me. It represents my justice. Are you guys following that?
So God doesn't absolve himself. You know what God doesn't do?
Where did that tree come from? No, God made that tree to demonstrate
that all evil, all judgment, all wrath proceeds from His holy
and just nature against every entity in the universe that would
rebel against His holiness. That's Proverbs 16, 4. The Lord
made all things for himself, even the evil, the wicked for
the day of evil. But listen to this. This is Ezekiel having
a great conversation with God about the apostates and hypocrites
in the church. Son of man. I'm sorry, I got
to get to Ezekiel chapter 13. I'm way over in 39. Another beautiful
portion. Here's what he says. And the word of the Lord came
unto me, Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel
that prophesy and say unto those, them that prophesy out of their
own hearts, hear you the word of the Lord. See, you see the
category of people to whom he's speaking? Prophets who are prophesying
out of their own hearts. Thus said the Lord God, woe unto
the foolish prophets that follow their own spirits and have seen
nothing. See it? I got a word from the
Lord. Okay. Oh Israel, your prophets
are like the foxes in the desert. You've not gone up in the gaps,
neither have you made up the hedges for the house of Israel
to stand in the battle of the day of the Lord. They have seen
vanity and lying divinations, saying the Lord said, thus said
the Lord, got a word from the Lord. Y'all reading it for yourself?
Good. And the Lord has not sent them.
And they have made others to hope that is gave them a word.
I got a word from the Lord for you to give you hope that they
will confirm the word. This is what they do in religion,
manipulate religious folk. They get a word that they said
from God and then they work it through the congregation and
they get other people affirming that word among themselves. Next
thing you know, it's in 20 churches. The same words in 20 churches.
You go to the other church and you know, I heard that from a
preacher over there. This is all a big scam. Verse seven,
have you not seen a vain vision? Have you not spoken lying divinations? Whereas you say the Lord said,
albeit I have not spoken. Therefore, thus saith the Lord
God, because you have spoken vanity and have seen lies, therefore
behold, I am against you. See it? Verse 10, because even because
they have seduced my people saying peace, and there was no peace
at all. Didn't he builds an analogy of
building walls with untempered martyr and God warns you can
build a wall, I'm gonna knock it down. You can build a wall,
I'm gonna knock it down. I want you to carry over to verse
22. your own time reverse chapter 13 get chapter 13 into your heart
because it'll help you understand how God hates false prophets
verse 22 because with lies you have made the heart of the righteous
sad got that this is how you can determine whether you're
a true believer if you hate false teaching then you're righteous
if you love false teaching you're still lost do you see it because
you've made a The heart of the righteous said whom I have not
made sad And you have strengthened the hands of the wicked there
you go You've given wicked people confidence to continue living
in wicked deeds By saying the lord loves you. The lord knows
the lord bless you Are you guys hearing? That they shouldn't return from
their wicked ways and you promise them life. Now
watch what God says. You see how God sits in church
services? You see how he sits in church
services? It takes full notes. You say this, you do that. The
whole of chapter 13 gives you a litany of their practices.
They're into the big church thing. They make pillows and handkerchiefs
and napkins and they sell bottles of water, anointed water from
the river in Israel. He caught him doing all that.
God took all the notes. Are you hearing me? He took all
the notes. Now they do that because in their
minds, guess what they say? The Lord does not see and the
Lord does not hear. But God's sitting right there
recording it all. Every bit of it what's going on in the church
is right up the street from me Right up the right up the street.
They're doing it all around the nation all around the world.
Are you guys hearing me right up the street? Maybe in some
of y'all churches playing these games Deceiving the masses hoodwinking
the people with medium gadgets Now watch this because what lies
you've made them Made the heart of the righteous said whom I've
not may say you strengthen the hands of the wicked that he should
not repent from his wicked way by promising him life. Therefore,
you shall see no more vanity nor divination, for I will deliver
my people out of your hand, and you shall know I'm the Lord.
You know what he does? He takes his elect out of false
churches like that. He takes his elect out of that
mess. Chapter 14. Here it is. Then came certain of the elders
of Israel. And the man sat before me and
the word of the Lord came to me saying, son of man, these
men have set up their idols in their heart. And they put the
stumbling block of their iniquity before their face. And they're
coming to you as if they're coming to me. Got that? They got big old idols in their
head. So big is covering their heart.
They couldn't see God if he showed up. but they're going to the
prophet as if they're ready to listen to God. So God taps Ezekiel
on the shoulder and say, see all of these cats, all 70 of
them, all these rulers, these are all lost men who hate God,
but love to play church. That's, that's what we are. Now
watch it. Son of man, These have set the
idols up in their heart, put the stumbling block of their
iniquity before their face. Should I be inquired of at all
by them? Therefore speak thou unto them
and say unto them, thus said the Lord God, every man of the
house of Israel that sets up his idol, where? And puts the
stumbling block of his iniquity before his face and comes to
the prophet. I want you to hear this. I, the
Lord will answer him. that cometh according to the
multitude of his idols. That construction there means
that God is going to intervene with the purpose of deceiving
him in relationship to that person's desire. That's what the construction
is saying. He's saying if you come to God
with a scheme in your heart, a plan in your heart, and it's
an idol, and it has nothing to do with the will of God, the
work of God, the worth of God, you just want your thing done,
and God has warned you, He will give you over to that deception.
He will actually intervene to make sure everything works out
so that you are fully and totally deceived. I'm getting ready to
show you that here in a moment. This is why playing games with
God in terms of your heart is eternally dangerous. Coming to God with a deceived
heart is eternally dangerous. This is just better not to go
to God. If you're gonna do your dirt, don't go to God. Just do
your dirt. Hope he sends a tow truck to
dig you out of that pit. But many women who think that
they can go to God with their idols in front of them have now
committed an affront against God himself. Right now you're
seeking to deceive God. Are you guys following me? And
some of y'all wonder how on earth can people do that? The heart
is deceitful and desperately wicked above everything. It will
deceive everybody, even God. Are you hearing me? So now watch
this, cause I want you to see how this works out. He says over in verse five, that
I may take the house of Israel in their own heart. See how he
sees the whole of Israel in this mess? Because they are all estranged
from me through their idols. The whole of Israel is separated
from God because of that. Now they go to church, they do
synagogue, they Sabbath every week, They say hallelujah and
praise the Lord, but they're separated from God by their idolatries Therefore say unto the house
of Israel thus said the Lord God repent And turn yourself
from your idols and turn away your faces from your abominations
for every one of the house of Israel or of the stranger that
sojourns in Israel which separates himself from me and sets up his
idol in his heart. See, you can't have God in the
idol too. You know what the text saying? You separate from me
when you set up the idol. When you set up the idol, you
separate from me. They're mutually exclusive. You can't have God
in that too. That's why I was saying earlier, you can't do
Ouija boards. You can't do astrology. You can't
do tarot cards. You can't do witches. You can't
do goblins. You can't do folks with familiar
spirits and Christ too. Can't be done. That's the problem
with Catholicism. and the evangelical church today
that is not biblically based. You can't do both. God is a jealous
God. Is he? Have you found him to
be jealous in your own life? People love to talk Bible. I'm
asking the question, have you found God to be jealous in your
life? He will shake your life up to
let you know he's not going to have any other lovers contending
with him. You're not going to have God's
grace, his goodness, his providence, his blessings. When you're trying
to move somebody else or something else in with him, he's just,
God is not that friendly with folks. God, God don't need all
that kind of company. Ooh, we got company. Come on
in. What's your name? No, it doesn't work with the
true and the living God This doesn't work I Want you to mark it now For
every one of the house of Israel or of the stranger verse 17 that sojourns in Israel and separates
himself from me and sets up the idol in his heart and puts the
stumbling block of his iniquity before his face and comes to
a prophet to inquire of him concerning me I the Lord will answer him
by myself you're in trouble you're in trouble see now here's something
that's going on here I'm getting ready to go through verses 1
through 13 and this gonna burn your ears For those of you who
have never read this text, but let me just talk to you practically
as a pastor. There's a point at which when
people are self-deceived and want to play games with Christ,
they lie to every point of contact between God and them. They lied
to everybody. They lied to their girlfriend,
lied to their boyfriend, lied to their husband, lied to their
wife, lied to their children, lied to their sister and their
brother, lied to their bosses. They lied to everybody. And then
they lied to the preacher, as I told you. When once you have
lied to all of them, it's just you and God. Because all during
that line of resistance, those barriers that God had put up,
He has warned you to stop lying. Tell the truth. Tell the truth. That's what he's doing. He's
warning us when he sets up these parameters and these boundaries
and these structures that are designed to touch our hearts.
When our hearts are soft, we know when we are seeking to manipulate
for our own way. When our hearts are soft, we
know we are seeking to manipulate for our own way. And then God
does something providentially, you know that was God. You got
about a second to soften your heart and say, you got me God.
You got me, I'm done. I'm done. I don't want to go
to the next level because the next level my heart is going
to be harder. So watch what it says in verse
8. And I will set my face against that man and I will make him
a sign and a proverb and I will cut him off from the midst of
my people and everyone will know it. Do you guys see that? So, so fascinating. I've got
a few more verses to go. I'll take a few questions if
you, if you guys aren't sinking in your seats too, too deep,
because this is very important stuff. I found that these kinds
of Bible lessons will change the direction of people's lives
for the good, because this is the kind of purging that the
spirit of God often has to do to keep certain people from calamities
that they already preparing for themselves. Cause we really do
set ourselves up for deception. If God is not nipping at us continually
about the subtleties of our own private agendas. We set ourselves
up. Cause see, we actually, here's
our problem. We actually think that we can think like God. We
actually think that. We actually think we can outwit
God. That's true. That's true. I'm
just, I've seen it so much in my life. It's, it's remarkable. I will set my face against that
man. I will make him a sign and a problem. You know what that
means? When God has done judging you, he lifts you up and shows
you to the whole congregation, makes you an example to the whole
congregation. See this person. They kept lying to themselves
and to me. until I had nothing else to do
but show them that they were committed to their evil. And
now I want you to see the consequence of self-deception. Do you guys
follow that? That's how this works. By the
time you and I see it, God had been a long time working with
that person. A long time working, I mean years. By the time they are exposed
in their mess, it's been years, because God's patient. But God is not permissive. He's
not gonna bend his rules for you or me So now notice what it says Verse
9 And if the prophet are you there
be deceived When he has spoken a thing Do you see that? Stop
right there that's exactly what God meant when he says now if
they put a the stumbling block of their iniquity before their
face. The analogy of a stumbling block of iniquity is something
that causes you to trip and fall as a stumbling block, which is
a metaphor of falling into sin. And to have the stumbling block
of your iniquity in front of your face means that you can
never successfully walk forward because you're always blocked
by your sin. Are you guys following that?
What God is saying is impossible for you to walk the path of faith
in the path of grace When you got a big old stumbling block
knocking you down every time you take a step Now if the prophet
be deceived when he has spoken a thing because you made it to
the prophet You made it to him. You made it to her You made it
to them and you put in your request and guess what that prophet did
that prophet told you exactly what you wanted to hear. It was
so absolutely accurate to every desire in your heart that you
swore that was from the Lord. That was from the Lord. I know
that was from the Lord. Ain't no way in the world that
prophet would have known what's in my heart. No way in the world
that prophetess would have known what's in my heart. God knows
what's in your heart. And God put in that prophet's
mouth the words to say, to seal that person in their doom. Are
you guys following that? This is not stretching the text.
It's simple and plain, isn't it? This text is simple and plain. God is owning the delusion and
deception. He's owning that. If the prophet
be deceived when he has spoken the thing, I, the Lord have deceived
that prophet and I will stretch out my hand upon him and I will
destroy him out of the midst of Israel. Why? Because he's a false prophet. Verse 10, and they shall bear
the punishment of their iniquity. Who's the they? Both of them.
The person that goes to the prophet and then the prophet. The punishment
of the prophet shall be even the punishment of him that seeketh
unto him. That the house of Israel may
go no more astray from me, neither be polluted anymore with all
their transgressions, but that they may be my people and I may
be their God, saith the Lord. See what God is saying? I will
intervene to work this deception in order to take a whole bunch
of people out in order that my elect My understand that you
don't play games with your God. That's exactly what God does.
Any questions? Anybody got any questions? Sincerely,
don't get quiet now. Go ahead on my.