April 17th - Biblical Open Air Preaching

Prayer Requests
Youth Pastor Candidate

Dave Sloan Preaching

Summit Sanctification

Big Shanty Festival Outreach

Easter Outreaches

Ian Health

Tyler Allergies

David's continued sanctification

Jennifer's dad's safe travels

James - Camping Scouts

Text – Nehemiah 8

Nehemiah 8 is the main reason I started going through Nehemiah. This is one of my favorite chapters in the Bible. A lot of times when I’m open-air preaching I get pseudo (name only) Christians saying, “Open-air preaching isn’t biblical!” Can you give me some examples of open-air preaching in the Bible? Noah, Jonah, Ezra, Paul, Peter, Stephen, and one more major example, Jesus. Open-air preaching is profoundly biblical, it is one of the major ways that Christianity has spread, great preachers of the past included Patrick, Boniface, John Knox, George Whitefield, and Charles Spurgeon, to name only a few of many.

Sometimes open-air preaching is done evangelically, to take the gospel out to people who normally wouldn’t listen, other times, like with George Whitefield and John Flavel, it was because they had no church to preach in. Whitefield was disliked by the Anglican Church, and Flavel was a Puritan, outlawed by the Anglican Church from mentioning his Christian beliefs. We’ll see today that often an open-air meeting is to accommodate massive numbers of people.

This passage has also been used heavily to drive the liturgy of the church. What is liturgy? The way we do church. It’s the way we sing, read the Bible, pray, and the actions we take during these things. There are lots of different liturgies between different denominations, I think it would be very foolish for us to try to say one way is the only right way, the important thing is that our motives are pure in how we do church. We’ll see some great things in Nehemiah today, but there are lots of other ways described throughout the Bible. One of my favorite examples is when Hannah prays silently but her mouth is moving, and it’s so weird to the priest that he accuses her of being drunk. Was she wrong? No. Can you pray silently or outloud? Yes, whichever seems most appropriate for the situation.

Let’s do some review real quick, what major even has just been completed in Nehemiah? They have just finished the wall and set the gates. The city of Jerusalem is now well on its way to restoration, but the spiritual side of Jerusalem is still pretty wrecked. How many days did it take to rebuild the wall? 52, was that quick? Yes, everyone who saw it had to agree that it was accomplished because God was with them, even in the face of severe persecution. So, let’s now take a look at the restoration of the spiritual state of Judah.

Nehemiah 8:1 And all the people gathered as one man into the square before the Water Gate. And they told Ezra the scribe to bring the Book of the Law of Moses that the Lord had commanded Israel.

Ezra wrote down the history of Jerusalem from the end of the Babylonian Exile to right before Nehemiah came to town. They call on him to read the Law, or more specifically the word here is Torah. What is the Torah/Law? It is the first 5 books of the Bible, the 5 books of Moses. What are they? Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy. There was a law, which the Jews had forsaken for at least 160 years, to read the Torah to all of the people every seven years. Some people believe that this was all five books, but most really good scholars believe this was just the book of Deuteronomy, which is really a great summation of the whole Torah, plus there is a verse that makes it sounds like just Deuteronomy:

Deuteronomy 31:10-13 And Moses commanded them, “At the end of every seven years, at the set time in the year of release, at the Feast of Booths, when all Israel comes to appear before the Lord your God at the place that he will choose, you shall read this law before all Israel in their hearing. Assemble the people, men, women, and little ones, and the sojourner within your towns, that they may hear and learn to fear the Lord your God, and be careful to do all the words of this law, and that their children, who have not known it, may hear and learn to fear the Lord your God, as long as you live in the land that you are going over the Jordan to possess.”

Ezra was called to read it, he was a scribe, it was his job to make copies of the Old Testament, this would make him especially well familiar with the Bible. Here is something you can consider doing that I have been doing for a while. I make a copy of one chapter of the Bible every week, it really slows me down and makes me think. It’s not the only way to make sure you pause to think on your Bible, but it is a great way.

Nehemiah 8:2 So Ezra the priest brought the Law before the assembly, both men and women and all who could understand what they heard, on the first day of the seventh month.

Here is an important point throughout church history until about the 1950's onward, that youth ministry was unheard of. If you were old enough to understand, you stood in the congregation and learned with the adults.

Nehemiah 8:3-4 And he read from it facing the square before the Water Gate from early morning until midday, in the presence of the men and the women and those who could understand. And the ears of all the people were attentive to the Book of the Law. And Ezra the scribe stood on a wooden platform that they had made for the purpose. And beside him stood Mattithiah, Shema, Anaiah, Uriah, Hilkiah, and Maaseiah on his right hand, and Pedaiah, Mishael, Malchijah, Hashum, Hashbaddanah, Zechariah, and Meshullam on his left hand.

This is five or six hours of reading, and we see that they were attentive, they paid attention to the reading. This wasn't all reading, as we'll see in a bit, there was explanation of what the text meant and even translation for those who didn't have a strong grasp of Hebrew, as many in attendance grew up speaking Chaldi, or the language of the Babylonians.

Nehemiah 8:5 And Ezra opened the book in the sight of all the people, for he was above all the people, and as he opened it all the people stood.

Speaking of liturgy, do you even wonder why the pastor stands on a stage? In recent years I think that many churches have utterly lost this concept and have turned the pulpit into nothing more than a stage for entertainment and self agrandizement. The reason for an elevated pulpit is for the main purpose that people can see and hear the one speaking. A secondary purpose is that it shows authority, and hopefully gives reverence to the message.

I find in open-air preaching that if I am standing even a few inches above my audience, that my voice carries farther, and people will stop and listen. I have preached from street level on occasion and have had much less visible evidence that people were listening than if I stand on a box or a wall.

Everyone could see Ezra opening the book, the Hebrew word here is cepher, it really ought not be translated "book", what Ezra opened here was a scroll.

When he opened it, all of the people stood in reverence. It was tradition to stand during the reading of scripture for much of the Dark Ages; during the Reformation, many traditions like this were outright done away with. There were a lot of other weird things people were doing that you can't find in the Bible, like reading the Bible in Latin to people who didn't speak Latin, or clothing to set the priests apart from the laity (called sacerdotalism), and all sorts of strange rules about things like communion, baptism, "crossing" yourself when you came before a crucifix, or bowing a certain number of times during the service. The Reformation did away with many of these things as Popish superstition.

Not all of it was unbiblical though, such as we see here the standing in reverence when the Law of God is opened. Here is where it can be wrong though, if the standing is just tradition or is mandated. It is better that you stay seated and give reverence to the hearing of the Word, than stand because everyone else does and ignore what is being said; not ignoring in hearing, but ignoring in believing and acting on.

Nehemiah 8:6 And Ezra blessed the LORD, the great God, and all the people answered, "Amen, Amen," lifting up their hands. And they bowed their heads and worshiped the LORD with their faces to the ground.

Here is one place we get the idea of praying before the scripture is read. Praying is always good, but again, if you just do it to do it, you're doing it wrong. We don't have it recorded in the Bible, but Jewish tradition has recorded what Ezra's prayer could have been. In order to break with tradition of only praying at the beginning and end of a lesson, lets pray Ezra's prayer now,

Blessed art thou, O Lord our God, King of the world, who hath chosen us out of all people, and hath given us his law; blessed art thou, O Lord, who hast given us the law; and all the people answer, Amen.

The Amen at the end literally means "Truth", and it is an affirmation of what has just been prayed. Yesterday at the Big Shanty Festival a very flamboyant person came up and asked to pray with us, it was awkward to say the least, at the end of his prayer, which was charismaniac goofiness, I was very reserved to give an "amen."

One thing which we don't often do is what they did, lifting their hands towards Heaven. I think one of the reasons we shy away from this is because it has been hijacked by the emotionalistic bents of christendom that want to "feel" something in worship, and their handraising is often almost cultish and very mystic (feelings based). But we have to remember that we don't reject biblical truth just because someone is doing it wrongly. Check out what Paul says,

1 Timothy 2:8 I desire then that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger or quarreling;

This is the method of Psalm 134, calling us to reach towards Heaven, moreso spiritually than physically, but also physically, when we are in need. We'll read a verse in the sermon on the mount in just a moment that will show us why, but before we do, can someone please read Psalm 134...the whole thing, if you're able:

Psalm 134:1-3 Come, bless the LORD, all you servants of the LORD, who stand by night in the house of the LORD! Lift up your hands to the holy place and bless the LORD! May the LORD bless you from Zion, he who made heaven and earth!

So then, they read the Law, what do we do if someone doesn't understand what it means, or even what it says? That's verse 7-8,

Nehemiah 8:7-8 Also Jeshua, Bani, Sherebiah, Jamin, Akkub, Shabbethai, Hodiah, Maaseiah, Kelita, Azariah, Jozabad, Hanan, Pelaiah, the Levites, helped the people to understand the Law, while the people remained in their places. They read from the book, from the Law of God, clearly, and they gave the sense, so that the people understood the reading.

They explain what it means, I love that it says they "read clearly", and I'd encourage you to know what a passage says before you stand to read it. I hate it when a preacher stands up to preach and it sounds like he's reading the passage for the first time as he begins his sermon. If you're going to read the Bible to other people, I beg of you, practice being a good reader. Several commentaries also say that the Hebrew words used here give an indication that the Law was also translated into other languages so that people whose first language was not Hebrew would get a perfect grasp of what was being said.

The Law is good, it is wonderful, it is a textual representation of who God is: holy, perfect, undefiled; but the Law is directly against us, when we sin it stands as a witness against us. When the people heard how perfect God is in the Law, it caused them to mourn, as we'll see in the next passage,

Nehemiah 8:9-12 And Nehemiah, who was the governor, and Ezra the priest and scribe, and the Levites who taught the people said to all the people, "This day is holy to the LORD your God; do not mourn or weep." For all the people wept as they heard the words of the Law. Then he said to them, "Go your way. Eat the fat and drink sweet wine and send portions to anyone who has nothing ready, for this day is holy to our Lord. And do not be grieved, for the joy of the LORD is your strength." So the Levites calmed all the people, saying, "Be quiet, for this day is holy; do not be grieved." And all the people went their way to eat and drink and to send portions and to make great rejoicing, because they had understood the words that were declared to them.

They are weeping over their sin, and it would have been rightly so, if it had not been during a festival (we'll see it in a minute), and all of the festivals pointed to the faithfulness of God towards a repentant people, which these people were.

Numbers 10:10 On the day of your gladness also, and at your appointed feasts and at the beginnings of your months, you shall blow the trumpets over your burnt offerings and over the sacrifices of your peace offerings. They shall be a reminder of you before your God: I am the LORD your God.

So Nehemiah sends them off not to mourn, but to feast. These sacrifices pointed forward to Jesus Christ, the perfect sacrifice,

Hebrews 7:27 He has no need, like those high priests, to offer sacrifices daily, first for his own sins and then for those of the people, since he did this once for all when he offered up himself.

This is why Nehemiah and the priests could tell the people not to mourn, but to celebrate, even though they saw that they were great sinners. This is why Jesus could make an extremely audacious claim in the Sermon on the Mount,

Matthew 5:4 Blessed are those who mourn, for they shall be comforted.

The Hebrew people in Nehemiah 8 had no idea (or very little idea) how that was going to take place, but they trusted that God was faithful, and because they trusted in God, they did their best to keep his laws. Which is our next section.

Nehemiah 8:13 On the second day the heads of fathers’ houses of all the people, with the priests and the Levites, came together to Ezra the scribe in order to study the words of the Law.

Pause here really quick, in Nehemiah 8 we see both corporate worship and private study. A church is much blessed when it has godly leaders who study and believe and act on their Bibles.

In it they discovered a law that they were forsaking, and called people to honor it:

Nehemiah 8:14-18 And they found it written in the Law that the LORD had commanded by Moses that the people of Israel should dwell in booths during the feast of the seventh month, and that they should proclaim it and publish it in all their towns and in Jerusalem, "Go out to the hills and bring branches of olive, wild olive, myrtle, palm, and other leafy trees to make booths, as it is written." So the people went out and brought them and made booths for themselves, each on his roof, and in their courts and in the courts of the house of God, and in the square at the Water Gate and in the square at the Gate of Ephraim. And all the assembly of those who had returned from the captivity made booths and lived in the booths, for from the days of Jeshua the son of Nun to that day the people of Israel had not done so. And there was very great rejoicing. And day by day, from the first day to the last day, he read from the Book of the Law of God. They kept the feast seven days, and on the eighth day there was a solemn assembly, according to the rule.

Let me sum this up for your real quick since we are quickly running out of time. The Feast of Tabernacles, or Feast of Booths, was a one week celebration where the people would live in "tents" made of palm fronds and other leafy branches. It commemorated a time in the desert with Moses when God dwelt in the midst of the people, not in a temple, but in a tent, and they could see his glory, for he was with them. It was meant to be a reminder of God's faithfulness in calling his people out of slavery into the promised land. Unfortunately the Jews had done a very bad job of commemorating this event, after all, it took a long time and a lot of effort, and was quite uncomfortable. It would be like me saying, next week don't go sleep in your own beds, we're going to camp in the parking lot. It was celebrated on and off since Joshua, but here it tells us that it was celebrated with more joy and more correctly than it had been since his time.

Jerusalem must have looked pretty weird during this time, with homemade tents all over, on roofs, in front yards, in two of the major open places, on every street. But the people were celebrating that God was faithful, that he would once against dwell with them, that they would once against see his glory.

I wish we had time to read John 7 and really look at it, but I want to point out really quickly that Jesus went to the Feast of Tabernacles and revealed himself as the purpose of the feast, but look at the last verses of that passage (which is actually the last verse of chapter 7 and first verse of chapter 8),

John 7:53-8:1 They went each to his own house, but Jesus went to the Mount of Olives.

So here-in is our conclusion, that Jesus Christ is the reason that the people were not to mourn over their sin, that the Law pointed towards him, the Feast of Tabernacles pointed towards his faithfulness, that he would dwell with his people and make them right with God. In John 7 they missed him altogether, beloved, I pray that you will not miss this Godman who dwelt among us.

John 1:14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

So beloved, testify to him, show the glory of God through the man who died on a cross but yet lives, who is the one who can say to those who mourn, you shall be comforted. Do so in public, or in private, study his word, tell people about him. Give full reverence to his Word, but moreso to him, do nothing from vain tradition, but out of respect to the Righteous and Resurrected One. Lift your hands and your soul towards him in recognition of your great need for his salvation and his blessings, and in that, I pray that he may bless you, he who made heaven and earth.

October 3rd - The Pleasures of Sin

Prayer Requests
Pastor Aaron Preaching
Scheduled Revival
Covington Fair
North Cobb Witnessing
Judgment Journey
Kyle Preaching at FCA
Boy Scouts fund raiser

Text – Zechariah 5:5-11, Proverbs 9

Today we approach Zechariah’s seventh vision, one of the more difficult ones to tell you what the exact details mean, but one where the greater point shines forth. We’re going to look at the attractiveness of sin, the world’s efforts to elevate it, and God’s ability to suppress it.

Let’s do just a bit of review, there isn’t much coming forward in this vision from the last ones, but I didn’t clarify a major point last week that I really apologize for missing because it’s an important point.

The last two visions talked about the Word of God, if we are in God’s New Covenant, in the church, symbolically depicted as a lampstand, then how does the Word of God relate to us? It is as a blessing. But if we have broken God’s everlasting covenant and are outside of the church, then how does the Word of God relate to us? As a curse.

How did God redeem us from the curse of the law? By hanging his blessed Son on a tree, for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree.” Was Jesus hanged on a sycamore or oak tree? He was hung on a cross; what is the cross made of? A tree. Is it a living tree? No, it is a dead tree; I think we could call it a tree of death. Christ redeemed us from the curse by becoming a curse for us, he has given us his blessings, he died on a tree of death to grant us access to the tree of life; for whosoever believes in him will not perish, but will have eternal life.

What part did God play in the sending of the curse and in cursing his Son? Did they surprise him? No, he accomplished both by his own power. The only real tie-in that I see between the sixth and seventh visions is that both are being sent by God’s will. The wickedness we see today is not outside of God’s plan, indeed it comes from the same place as the curse, it may be that this vision is the curse in manifestation. So let’s read this seventh vision.

Zechariah 5:5-11 Then the angel who talked with me came forward and said to me, "Lift your eyes and see what this is that is going out." And I said, "What is it?" He said, "This is the basket that is going out." And he said, "This is their iniquity in all the land." And behold, the leaden cover was lifted, and there was a woman sitting in the basket! And he said, "This is Wickedness." And he thrust her back into the basket, and thrust down the leaden weight on its opening. Then I lifted my eyes and saw, and behold, two women coming forward! The wind was in their wings. They had wings like the wings of a stork, and they lifted up the basket between earth and heaven. Then I said to the angel who talked with me, "Where are they taking the basket?" He said to me, "To the land of Shinar, to build a house for it. And when this is prepared, they will set the basket down there on its base."

I’m going to do my best today to teach this like it should be taught. That’s what I always do, but today it could be tempting to try to take some of the offense out of this message, but I want you to see just how God sees the world and that outward beauty is not everything, I’m going to teach this along with Proverbs 9, because the two are closely tied together. If you’re not offended by the end of this lesson, then I’ve done something wrong.

v.5 Then the angel who talked with me came forward and said to me, "Lift your eyes and see what this is that is going out."

Visions six, seven, and eight all proceed out of Heaven, God sending forth either his law, or his plan, or his ministers. Zechariah is going to see a measuring basket, he’d know it was a measuring basket because these were really common in Israel, they hold about 7 gallons of whatever you want them to hold. When he asks what it is, he knows it’s a measuring basket, he wants to know what it’s measuring.

v.6 And I said, "What is it?" He said, "This is the basket that is going out." And he said, "This is their iniquity in all the land."

This verse is translated to interpret the passage for us. I’m not sure if I like that, though if you were reading the Bible in a year and only spent four days on Zechariah, I think I would like this interpretation, though this verse says something different in the Hebrew than what it says here, though they did a good job capturing the meaning of the passage without capturing the wording. What Jesus actually says here is that this is the resemblance of the world, or this is what God sees the world as, the original doesn’t have any meaning of sin, the translators are interpreting rightly what they read in verse 8. So what this measuring basket holds is what God sees the world as. So let’s see what this basket holds.

v.7 And behold, the leaden cover was lifted,

Wait, let’s stop there. The first thing we see is that whatever this basket is holding is protected by a big heavy weight. God is keeping what is inside inside…we see something odd here for a measuring basket, you wouldn’t put a heavy weight over seven gallons of grain. What do you think a weight would be used for? Whatever is inside is living and wants to escape!

Proverbs 29:18 Where there is no prophetic vision the people cast off restraint, but blessed is he who keeps the law.

Second Thessalonians tells us that God is also restraining the spirit of antichrist:

2 Thessalonians 2:6-7 And you know what is restraining him now so that he may be revealed in his time. For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. Only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way.

Let’s then look at what’s inside:

v. 7-8 and there was a woman sitting in the basket! And he said, "This is Wickedness."

Strange. I don’t know where to start, there are several exceedingly great points here. Let’s start with the fact that the woman is called Wickedness, because I think that’s important. This isn’t the part that’s meant to offend you, but if I taught this wrongly, then it could.

Do you think the woman represents wickedness because all women are irredeemably wicked or wickeder than men? No, of course not, we know that the Bible says ALL have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, Zechariah just said this is the appearance of ALL land. I believe, and we’ll look at the verses that make me believe this, that this woman must be pretty cute and attractive and she represents the allure of sin as well as the actual sin.

Some sin is ugly and nasty and only certain people enjoy it, but most sin has a pleasure that comes with it. Sin can be really fun, if it wasn’t people wouldn’t do it…though some people sin and are miserable for it.

Hebrews 11:24-25 By faith Moses, when he was grown up, refused to be called the son of Pharaoh’s daughter, choosing rather to be mistreated with the people of God than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin.

The attractiveness of the female form is an amazing representative of this, John calls it the lust of the flesh and eyes.

1 John 2:16 For all that is in the world— the desires of the flesh and the desires of the eyes and pride in possessions—is not from the Father but is from the world.

Before you think God hates women, let’s read Proverbs 9 where both wisdom and wickedness are represented by women:

Proverbs 9:1-6,13-18 Wisdom has built her house; she has hewn her seven pillars. She has slaughtered her beasts; she has mixed her wine; she has also set her table. She has sent out her young women to call from the highest places in the town, "Whoever is simple, let him turn in here!" To him who lacks sense she says, "Come, eat of my bread and drink of the wine I have mixed. Leave your simple ways, and live, and walk in the way of insight."

The woman Folly is loud; she is seductive and knows nothing. She sits at the door of her house; she takes a seat on the highest places of the town, calling to those who pass by, who are going straight on their way, "Whoever is simple, let him turn in here!" And to him who lacks sense she says, "Stolen water is sweet, and bread eaten in secret is pleasant." But he does not know that the dead are there, that her guests are in the depths of Hell.

So let me give you the practicality of this, and it’s pretty much the same for both the ladies and gentlemen in this class: not all that is beautiful is good and not all that is frugal is bad. Guys, the girls that show off the most are the ones you want the least, because everything they are is on display; while the modestly dressed and reserved ones are a depth of beauty that goes far beyond their appearance.

Ladies, there is a reason that sin is compared to a woman, because just by wearing immodest clothing you can ignite a fire in a man’s heart that cannot be put out. I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again, you do us a huge favor when you dress modestly. The true danger of seeking the fleeting pleasures of sin is that it is insatiable, it will burn every last bit of fuel you give it and still want more. Lust cannot be satisfied just once or through one inappropriate look, and so you only have two choices, to feed your sinful desires indefinitely, or to kill your sin immediately. John Owen put it better than I ever could, he said, “Be killing sin or sin will be killing you.”

Guys, Job said we should make a covenant with our eyes to avoid looking at the fleeting lust of the eyes. And ladies, besides the opportunity to cause someone to lust, you have to also worry about pride, having an obsession with guys finding you attractive. I’m not lying when I say that each and every one of you is beautiful beyond words, and I hope you realize when I say that it is also considering your inward person. You have a tremendous responsibility to practice discretion in what you wear and how much you show to the world. You have one chance to preserve a gift you will someday give to your future husband when he is privileged to something the rest of the world has never seen.

I hope this at least makes you think, and even a little uncomfortable. This is a sin area that we avoid discussing way too often in the church and one that, if we get it right in this class, will bless you and me and hopefully the whole church for the whole next generation. The only part of teaching middle school that I don’t like is the never ending cycle of seeing young ladies flaunt themselves and young men follow their eyes wherever they take them. By me saying this now hopefully I’ll never have to smack one of you guys in the back of the head when I catch you looking at something or someone you shouldn’t, and I’ll never have to ask you ladies to remove a picture off of facebook or put on a sweater in the middle of summer to cover yourself up, things I’ve had to do in the past.

Let’s conclude this thought with a bit of humor, but also great depth, through a Proverb and then move on with Zechariah:

Proverbs 11:2 Like a gold ring in a pig’s snout is a beautiful woman without discretion.

There are vast and reaching reasons why God symbolizes wickedness with a beautiful woman, because the façade can and does hide all manners of uncouthness and evilness; a little honey can hide the taste of poison. God sees to the inward person; describing that sin makes everything ugly and that even if there is a bit of external beauty, it’s like a gold ring in the nose of a pig.

Back to the basket: there is a measuring basket full of wickedness. What do you think this means? That our sins aren’t just a pinch or a little bit, but are filling up the fullness of what God allows us to do. Imagine God’s patience as the payment for this measure, that when sin is filled God’s patience runs out. We see this in reality in the destruction of the Amorites as God waited for them to sin to the full measure before he destroyed them.

Genesis 15:16 In the fourth generation they shall come hither again: for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full.

We see a measure for nations and also a measure for the human heart,

Acts 8:22-23 Repent of this wickedness and pray to the Lord. Perhaps he will forgive you for having such a thought in your heart. For I see that you are full of bitterness and captive to sin.

Acts 13:10 You son of the devil, you enemy of all righteousness, full of all deceit and villainy, will you not stop making crooked the straight paths of the Lord?

Let’s look at this from the standpoint of modesty, let me use the guys as an example. Just thinking someone is pretty is not a sin, but if you fail to kill the possibility of sin, of becoming obsessed with that person and having no intention of marrying them then you are sinning against five people: her, you, her future husband, your future wife, and above all you sin against God.

James 1:15 Desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.

We’ll see the gospel in just a bit, but let’s look at what happens next:

v.8 And he thrust her back into the basket, and thrust down the leaden weight on its opening.

We see that God is more than capable of restraining sin, yet he lets sin happen every day. This was alluded to when we read earlier that God is restraining the spirit of antichrist in what Paul calls the Mystery of Iniquity, God showing us why righteousness is good and evil is bad, showing why he is God and we are not, that he is able to use everything for good, even evil, as demonstrated most amazingly when he took the most wicked execution tool ever, the cross, and used it to save his people. We see though that as he thrusts Wickedness down, there is no love between God and evil.

God has many ways of restraining sin, one of which is our conscience, telling us what is right and wrong, second is the Bible, explicitly telling us what is right and wrong, and another is shame, making us feel bad when we sin; the Christian also has the Holy Spirit who leads us and is grieved, saddened, when we sin. I believe God’s major tool for loosing sin is when he removes shame, I want to read you a passage in a bit from Ezekiel where God is furious at Israel’s sin, I’m going to read it because of the choice words God uses, first though let’s read verse 9.

v.9 Then I lifted my eyes and saw, and behold, two women coming forward! The wind was in their wings. They had wings like the wings of a stork, and they lifted up the basket between earth and heaven.

This is the ONLY place in the whole Bible that remotely says that angels can be female, though because it’s a vision I don’t think we should make that jump. It sounds like angels are only male and Jesus explicitly said that angels never marry, so it'd be weird if there were boy and girl angels. What we should see these women as is sin elevating sin, think of them again as embodying wickedness, and we see that through a sort of strange way: they have wings like storks. The stork in the Bible is representative of uncleanliness, it is a carnivore and scavenger that will eat anything; these women, whether fallen angels or just symbolic of more evil, are definitely meant to convey that evil is elevating evil, and the wind in their wings means they are able to move swiftly, accomplishing evil things very quickly.

Deciding the best order to teach this in is difficult, there is so much to say, so let’s read Ezekiel 16 so I can get to where I want to get to.

Ezekiel 16:15,23-25,28-29,30,31 You trusted in your beauty and played the harlot because of your renown and lavished your sexual favors on any passerby; your beauty became his. And after all your wickedness (woe, woe to you! declares the Lord GOD), you built yourself a vaulted chamber and made yourself a lofty place in every square. At the head of every street you built your lofty place and made your beauty an abomination, offering yourself to any passerby and multiplying your harlotries. You played the harlot also with the Assyrians, because you were not satisfied; yes, you played the harlot with them, and still you were not satisfied. You multiplied your iniquities also with the trading land of Chaldea, and even with this you were not satisfied. How sick is your heart, declares the Lord GOD, because you did all these things, the deeds of a brazen prostitute, yet you were not like a prostitute, because you scorned payment.

Do you get the point that God hates it when sin is elevated and made the ultimate goal of everything? Let’s see what those winged women are going to do with this basket of wickedness.

v.10 Then I said to the angel who talked with me, "Where are they taking the basket?" He said to me, "To the land of Shinar, to build a house for it. And when this is prepared, they will set the basket down there on its base."

I really wish Zechariah would have asked, “What are these two winged women?” But he doesn’t, and so this is one of the details I can’t tell you exactly what they mean, though I think we’ve seen it pretty closely that they represent more sin. They are taking the basket to the land of Shinar, which is in Babylon. This is played out exceedingly in the New Testament that the world is referred to as Babylon and Christians are the exiles from our home in Heaven.

The word for house is more than just a plain building, but it’s less than a temple. It’s like a really nice house, even a palace. The two winged women are building a palace for wickedness, I don’t think it would be wrong to allegorize that they are making sin comfortable, even to the point of worshipping their sin.

We run into problems as Christians with displaying the 10 Commandments in public, or reading the Bible in school. Do you know why the world hates these things? I mean, what is to hate about any of the Commandments morally? If everyone kept them we’d have a nice society. The problem is that the Law and Word of God make people uncomfortable in their sin, they don’t want to hear of a judgment to come, they want to eat and drink and be merry and at the end of the road die and not face judgment. But comfortable sin is living in a lie, we need to know that apart from Christ’s saving work, we are set to be judged, and that in Christ’s saving work we are changed to hate sin and seek not to make it comfortable, but to kill it.

Romans 8:13-14 For if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are sons of God.

Finally, are you and I counted in this appearance of all the world? Are we full of sin? Absolutely, I bet you we’ve all broken every one of the 10 Commandments in spirit if not in flesh, and the measure of our sin is draining God’s patience. But let’s look at some verses to conclude why we do not despair and why we turn from making our sin comfortable to striving for holiness through Jesus Christ.

Let’s look first at my all time favorite Bible verse:

John 1:14 And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us, and we have seen his glory, glory as of the only Son from the Father, full of grace and truth.

Psalm 86:15 You, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.

Psalm 116:5 The LORD is gracious and righteous; our God is full of compassion.

While we were filling up the full measure of our sin, Christ filled up the full measure of righteousness, and in his fullness he humbled himself to become nothing, pouring out his life on cross so that we who are poor in spirit may be rich in spirit in Christ. He has canceled our sin and made us abound in his grace.

Therefore, let us put sin to death in our lives, not pampering it, not worshipping it, and certainly not living with it. Else we see that our God is also full of wrath towards his enemies, and will make a complete end to them, even pursuing them into the darkness.

September 26 - The Curse of the Law

Prayer Requests
Pastor Aaron - Matt 28
Covington Witnessing, esp Charles and New Age Lady
Preaching at KSU
Students still traveling - Back to School
North Cobb Homecoming Ministry
Shelby's Detention

Text – Zechariah 5:1-4

Last week we looked at a really complicated lighting system, what was it made up of? It was a seven pronged lampstand with tubes running from a big golden bowl and the bowl was connected to two olive trees. What was the main point of this lighting system? That it was automated, and apart from God we can do nothing. The verse the sums it all up is,

Zechariah 4:6 Then he said to me, "This is the word of the LORD to Zerubbabel: Not by might, nor by power, but by my Spirit, says the LORD of hosts."

Who are the two olive trees representative of? First the King and the High Priest, and more permanently Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit. One thing that I forgot to mention completely was the oil and what it represents. What sort of oil was this? Olive oil. What was its purpose? Fuel to the lamps so they would stay lit.

Looking at the New Testament, what does the lampstand represent? The church, and individual churches. How are churches fueled by God? Through the Word of Christ:

John 17:17-19 Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be sanctified in truth.

So the oil here represents God's Word to his people, under the Old Covenant this was delivered in sundry and amazing ways, but today it is delivered through God's Son, as revealed through the Bible. You remember that I said that the Hebrew is vague on exactly how the oil gets from the bowl to the lampstand, it's either 7 tubes or 49 tubes or maybe and probably 7 tubes from the bowl and 7 tubes connecting the lamps together. This way the lights are all connected and this reminds us to constantly be edifying the saints, and fellowship of individual churches, and sharing Bible verses and encouraging one another to shine forth in the world.

Ephesians 5:14 "Awake, O sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you."

Last week it could be said that the Word is a blessing, an anointing that fuels us and allows us to do great works. Our lesson today is going to look at the Word of God not as a blessing but as a curse. Before we read Zechariah I want to show you that just because we now walk in the light does not guarantee we will always be in the light, a church can lose its way and become mired in either doctrine or love, failing to love righteousness, and be both hearers and doers of God's Word.

Revelation 2:4-5 I have this against you, that you have abandoned the love you had at first. Remember therefore from where you have fallen; repent, and do the works you did at first. If not, I will come to you and remove your lampstand from its place, unless you repent.

So let's read Zechariah 5:1-4 and see the Word turned towards those who are neither hearers nor doers and see that it is a curse to many.

Zechariah 5:1-4 Again I lifted my eyes and saw, and behold, a flying scroll! And he said to me, "What do you see?" I answered, "I see a flying scroll. Its length is twenty cubits, and its width ten cubits." Then he said to me, "This is the curse that goes out over the face of the whole land. For everyone who steals shall be cleaned out according to what is on one side, and everyone who swears falsely shall be cleaned out according to what is on the other side. I will send it out, declares the LORD of hosts, and it shall enter the house of the thief, and the house of him who swears falsely by my name. And it shall remain in his house and consume it, both timber and stones."

Picture this scroll for our intents and purposes as a flying Bible, that is how Zechariah would have understood it, the very Word of God in action.

v.1-2 Again I lifted my eyes and saw, and behold, a flying scroll! And he said to me, "What do you see?" I answered, "I see a flying scroll. Its length is twenty cubits, and its width ten cubits."

The first time we see this scroll it is airborne, but not moving, the Hebrew means it is hovering. This scroll is MASSIVE, it's the size of a room, specifically the Holy Place of the Temple. A cubit is the length of your arm from elbow to finger-tip. It's not particularly strange that it's so big, there are several large scrolls of ancient antiquity. This would have been a parchment scroll, animal skin, and we see that it is going without the help of men, just as we saw earlier that the lamps stay lit without the help of men.

First we just see it hovering, but soon we'll see it moving:

v.3 Then he said to me, "This is the curse that goes out over the face of the whole land."

It goes out, not just over Israel, but over the whole world. This curse is the law of God, which is not a sin itself, but reveals sin in our lives and shows what sin is, and so such it becomes a curse to all sinners:

Romans 7:7-10 What then shall we say? That the law is sin? By no means! Yet if it had not been for the law, I would not have known sin. For I would not have known what it is to covet if the law had not said, "You shall not covet." But sin, seizing an opportunity through the commandment, produced in me all kinds of covetousness. For apart from the law, sin lies dead. I was once alive apart from the law, but when the commandment came, sin came alive and I died. The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me.

Read verse 10 again, The very commandment that promised life proved to be death to me.

That started long ago in the Garden of Eden, but it continues today in our own sin:

Romans 5:12 Therefore, just as sin came into the world through one man, and death through sin, and so death spread to all men because all sinned.

How can we say that the law of God is a curse to the whole world if the whole world hasn't read God's law? It's not for lack of effort that they don't have the law, missionaries have been sending the Bible out for thousands of years, but many reject it and outlaw it and burn it and think that they have found another way to be justified, but this law doesn't need to be in written form to stand against sinners, indeed, just hearing the law doesn't set those who have the Bible above those who don't.

Romans 2:12-16 For all who have sinned without the law will also perish without the law, and all who have sinned under the law will be judged by the law. For it is not the hearers of the law who are righteous before God, but the doers of the law who will be justified. For when Gentiles, who do not have the law, by nature do what the law requires, they are a law to themselves, even though they do not have the law. They show that the work of the law is written on their hearts, while their conscience also bears witness, and their conflicting thoughts accuse or even excuse them on that day when, according to my gospel, God judges the secrets of men by Christ Jesus.

There are no lack of verses that back this up, do you get the point though, that the Bible can be both a blessing and a curse? It reveals the words of eternal life, but if we don't heed them we will be cursed by the Bible. Alternately we don't trust in just reading the Bible and sort of keeping it, though many people in the past did, and many people today still do. Christ was very harsh towards them:

John 5:45-47 Do not think that I will accuse you to the Father. There is one who accuses you: Moses, on whom you have set your hope. For if you believed Moses, you would believe me; for he wrote of me. But if you do not believe his writings, how will you believe my words?

Let's look at a short sample of the sort of curses Moses gave, this is Deuteronomy 27:

"'Cursed be the man who makes a carved or cast metal image, an abomination to the LORD, a thing made by the hands of a craftsman, and sets it up in secret.' And all the people shall answer and say, 'Amen.'

"'Cursed be anyone who dishonors his father or his mother.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'

"'Cursed be anyone who moves his neighbor’s landmark.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'

"'Cursed be anyone who misleads a blind man on the road.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'

"'Cursed be anyone who perverts the justice due to the sojourner (traveler), the fatherless, and the widow.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'

I'm going to summarize verse 20-23 for the sake of you getting the point, go back and read this later with your parents, but there is a greater point here than the individual sins that are being committed. Somebody read 1 Thessalonians 4:3 for us before we go any farther:

1 Thessalonians 4:3 This is the will of God, your sanctification: that you abstain from sexual immorality...

"'Cursed be anyone who performs sexual immorality, for they sin against God, themselves, and other people.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'

"'Cursed be anyone who strikes down his neighbor in secret.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'

"'Cursed be anyone who takes a bribe to shed innocent blood.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'

"'Cursed be anyone who does not confirm the words of this law by doing them.' And all the people shall say, 'Amen.'

This is just a taste of how the law of Moses can curse, there are many other ways. Let's go back to Zechariah and see how it will curse according to his vision:

v.3 For everyone who steals shall be cleaned out according to what is on one side, and everyone who swears falsely shall be cleaned out according to what is on the other side.

These are commandments, right? Stealing is the eighth, lying is the ninth. These are the two that I find people have the least problem with, but here God is saying that these are fit to be cursed and eradicated by his law. His perfection requires perfection, he cannot tolerate even the smallest of sins.

Revelation 21:8 ...all liars, their portion will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.

Yesterday we witnessed to a young man named Charles who said he would get into Heaven because he knew God and loved his world and the people in the world. I asked him he ever lied to anyone, he said he had, I said he had failed to love that person. I asked if he had ever stolen from someone, he said he had, I told him that he wasn't loving that person. I asked about hating someone and looking with lust, and Charles realized quite quickly that he wasn't loving people, but that the curse of the law would be his downfall. This is why people curse: cursed words are an indication of the condition of our heart, for out of our heart our mouth professes:

Matthew 12:34 You brood of vipers! How can you speak good, when you are evil? For out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks.

Is this law just incidentally a curse, and God is sad and surprised that it brings death? No, not at all, in verse 4 we see that God is the one using his law a curse:

v.4 I will send it out, declares the LORD of hosts, and it shall enter the house of the thief, and the house of him who swears falsely by my name. And it shall remain in his house and consume it, both timber and stones.

This curse will find the sinner where they live, there is no hiding or amnesty or statute of limitations.

Numbers 32:23 But if you will not do so, behold, you have sinned against the LORD, and be sure your sin will find you out.

God is making an allusion in verse 4 to the law causing those who break it to be similar to lepers. (Leviticus 14:43-45) Leprosy defiles a person and prevents them from standing in God's presence, and they are required to tear down their house and take it out of the city. The law will put a person out of God's presence and city forever. It is very tempting to say that this is another reason why Jesus Christ went out of the city, that they destroyed the temple of his body and took it outside of the city and this was God symbolically taking all sin outside of the city in Christ's body. However, the New Testament doesn't affirm this so we'll have to wait 'till we get to Heaven to be sure this was a direct fulfillment. I'm fairly sure it's right though.

But there is a direct fulfillment about this curse in the New Testament and so let me show you that while we were all condemned under the law, cursed by our failure to affirm and do everything there-in written. Let's look at one that we haven't personally been cursed by:

Deuteronomy 21:22-23 If a man has committed a crime punishable by death and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, his body shall not remain all night on the tree, but you shall bury him the same day, for a hanged man is cursed by God. You shall not defile your land that the LORD your God is giving you for an inheritance.

None of us has been cursed by being hanged on a tree, but do you know anyone who has?

Galatians 3:13 Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, "Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree."

So there is hope for the cursed, there is an anointing from the Anointed One whom was cursed for us, he stood in our place, consumed by his Father's wrath for our transgressions. We must repent towards God, we must trust wholly in his saving work, we must apologize for our sins and seek forgiveness from the God who justifies.

If we won't, this curse will lead to our damnation, not because the law is sin, but because that very commandment which meant life has become death to us when we transgressed it.

Those who will not repent are storing up wrath to be revealed on the day of wrath, as Isaiah says so well,

Isaiah 24:4-6 The earth mourns and withers; the world languishes and withers; the highest people of the earth languish. The earth lies defiled under its inhabitants; for they have transgressed the laws, violated the statutes, broken the everlasting covenant. Therefore a curse devours the earth, and its inhabitants suffer for their guilt; therefore the inhabitants of the earth are scorched, and few men are left.

Therefore a curse devours the earth, and its inhabitants suffer for their guilt...Beloved, I implore you, in the name of Christ, do not put your trust in this law which we cannot keep, rather put your trust in the Law Giver and Keeper, Christ himself, who though he was perfect in every way, gave himself up to deliver us from this present evil age according to the will of our great God and Father:

Deuteronomy 30:15-20 "See, I have set before you today life and good, death and evil. If you obey the commandments of the LORD your God that I command you today, by loving the LORD your God, by walking in his ways, and by keeping his commandments and his statutes and his rules, then you shall live and multiply, and the LORD your God will bless you in the land that you are entering to take possession of it. But if your heart turns away, and you will not hear, but are drawn away to worship other gods and serve them, I declare to you today, that you shall surely perish. You shall not live long in the land that you are going over the Jordan to enter and possess. I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your offspring may live, loving the LORD your God, obeying his voice and holding fast to him, for he is your life and length of days, that you may dwell in the land that the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, to give them."