Answering Atheism Pt. 2

[0:00] when you're soul winning and so you don't really need to, I don't know, I guess you probably don't need to do what I do and read all their books and stuff. Once you get the general gist down, that's really all you need but I try to stay on top of it with what's coming out in the new stuff and like I showed you last night, you know, they believe now we're in a bubble bath of universes and I also like to read it because of that stuff. Like it's comedic relief sometimes and so I know it gets boring and I know hearing it now it may not make a whole lot of sense to you or at least may not seem applicable but when you're on the street and these things come up and Lord willing, you'll remember what we talked about tonight, be able to show somebody from the scriptures the answer as the Bible tells you to be ready to give an answer to every man that asketh you of the hope which lies within you and so with that, let's get into it. I won't waste too much time with talking in the intro stuff but let's go to Revelation chapter 3 and Colossians chapter 1 again just as a solid reminder of why you need to go over these things every now and then.

[1:06] Jude tells you that you need to earnestly contend for the faith and Paul tells you that you are to fight the good fight of faith and so there is a good fight to be engaged in and there is a contention that you ought to have and although it's not with flesh and blood, you still ought to be out there trying to win the souls and that contention is a spiritual battle that you and I are in. We're not called to go out and take land for the Lord Jesus Christ now. We're not back in the Crusades and all that kind of stuff. That stuff is anti-scriptural. Okay, we're not going to go take Jerusalem back and all that kind of stuff. You're fighting for souls now and so that contention for the faith is to propagate faith with souls and so to try to win them. Now in Revelation chapter 3, we've looked at this every night now, Sunday night, last night, and tonight. We're going to start again with it.

[1:58] But in Revelation chapter 3 and verse 14, it was like 14 and verse were coming out at the same time. Verse 14, the Bible says, And unto the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write, These things saith the Amen, the faithful and true witness, the beginning of the creation of God.

[2:16] And as I've been showing you in Colossians chapter 4, I think you're in Colossians chapter 1, you can hang out there. But in Colossians chapter 4, if you want to write this down, Colossians 4 and 16, the Bible says, When this epistle is read among you, cause that it be read also in the church of the Laodiceans.

[2:31] And that you likewise read the epistle from Laodicea. And so in the Laodicean epistle that the Lord gave you and I, it is interesting that as the Lord quotes and reminds you of the creation in Revelation chapter 3, and he also does it in the epistle to the Laodiceans in Colossians chapter 1.

[2:50] We've looked at it before, but let's look at it again. Verse 15, Colossians chapter 1 and verse 15, Who is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of every creature? For by him were all things created that are in heaven and that are in earth, visible and invisible, whether it be thrones or dominions or principality or powers.

[3:07] All things were created by him and for him. And he is before all things and by him all things consist. And so you need to be reminded that in the Laodicean church period, the Lord's trying to remind you who did the creating.

[3:21] God is the one that did the creating. Science, as we saw last night, science has no answers. All they have is a bunch of guesses. And I forgot to read you, I was reading that little bit about the bubble bath last night, and that was so funny that I forgot to read you the phrase, the quote from that scientist at a talk that Stephen Meyer was at.

[3:42] But he's, and I didn't bring my Kindle tonight because I forgot about it, but he says in there that science cannot prove anything definitively. And I was a scientist at a college doing a talk.

[3:54] That wasn't a Baptist preacher. Okay, so science has no answer for you. And you come to the Bible and it gives you the absolute truth on things. And so the Lord starts out the book with, In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.

[4:05] And so we were looking at that Sunday night. Last night we looked at the atheist arguments and what they come out with in their very own books. We looked at Dawkins' arguments and we looked at Harris' arguments and we looked at Boghossian and then we saw the Dawkins clip last night.

[4:19] We ran out of time to cover the material tonight. So tonight we're going to look at their common arguments. Now what ends up happening is scientists, you know, using that term loosely, they put out these books, right?

[4:31] How many of you have been soul winning and heard somebody talk about the spaghetti monster in the sky? Anybody? That comes out of Dawkins' book. That's out of the God delusion. And that's where that thing originates from.

[4:43] So when you're out there talking with them, they're reading these books, see? And then they're making judgments on what the books say and then they try to talk to you. So when you're talking with an atheist on the street, they'll typically have one of these four arguments, if not all four, to ask you about.

[5:00] And what they'll try to do is talk you out of your faith on these four arguments. We're going to go through these arguments tonight and there are only four of them. And if you can get these four down out of scripture, you'll get the majority of the arguments from.

[5:12] Now they're there. I put them kind of basically. The first one is God is immoral. And I saw that last night with Dawkins' clip. Remember him reading out of his own book how he's a genocidal maniac and all that? But God's immoral.

[5:23] Now that will show up in many different forms. I had that marine atheist ask me, you know, what about bone cancer in children? You know, that kind of a stuff. Why would God allow that to happen to little kids?

[5:35] So that's kind of that first argument kind of thing. God's immoral. And the second one is why did Jesus have to die? This was Hitchens' hobby horse. Now, this one's going to be Dawkins, mainly.

[5:51] This one's going to be Hitchens, Christopher Hitchens. Not that you need to know that. He's dead now anyway. The good and evil is going to be Harris, Sam Harris. And which God?

[6:03] That'll be all three of them. We'll use that. And Hawking and all that kind of a stuff. That's kind of a culmination of all of them. But Christopher Hitchens made a big deal about how God wasn't powerful enough to save us without torturing his own kid.

[6:17] That's how he would say it. And so the Lord gave him throat cancer and killed him with it. But that's just a side note. That's just coinkydinky. That's all that is. And the good and evil problem.

[6:30] Of course, you've probably heard that before. You know, the problem of good and evil. Why is there evil there and good and all that kind of stuff. And that takes many different forms, man. The main one you'll find when you're doing some witnessing will be why do bad things happen to good people.

[6:45] That'll be the big one. You know, that's kind of the main one. And then which God? That one's like their last resort. If you can deal with them on the first three and they're still talking and engaging with you, then their last trump card is going to be, well, how are we supposed to know which God to choose from out of the billions of God and the Hindus and the thousands of God from the Indians and all that kind of stuff?

[7:08] Well, how do we know which one? And so we're going to go through all this tonight, Lord willing. We'll make time for it. Now, with that first one, God is immoral, or at least the idea that God is immoral.

[7:21] So you could argue it like this. It's like, how do you know what morality is? But again, that's just heads talking. And so we're not going to go down that line of thought, although that's where you make fun of them.

[7:34] Who was asking about making fun of them? Yeah, if you want to do it there. Well, how do you even know what morality is? But let's go back to the Old Testament now. Let's get, they think that God is immoral because they misunderstand God.

[7:49] Now, this will come about. They'll mention things like God's genocidal and all that kind of stuff. But come back to Genesis chapter 3. We're going to go back to where it all began.

[8:03] And an atheist will try to show you that God told, you know, Moses and the nation of Israel to go wipe out this people. And, you know, God allowed all this stuff to happen.

[8:14] And so I wouldn't trust him because he's not as moral as I am. And it showed you last night that even with atheist literature, they have no basis for morality.

[8:25] And atheism and even Darwinian evolution is not humanitarian. So why all of a sudden the kick towards humanitarianism? Where did they get that from?

[8:36] You know, like, listen, if natural selection by random mutation is the driver for evolution, what are you so worried about humans for? The weak will die and the strong will live.

[8:47] That's what you believe. But that just goes to show you that they don't. Now, here's where it all begins. Genesis chapter 3, you know the truth of the matter. The devil comes in here, the serpent, in Genesis chapter 3, verse 1.

[9:00] The Bible says this, So here the devil is. This is before the devil falls, it looks like, in what's known as the gap fact.

[9:14] And so he falls before Adam and Eve were created. And so he shows up on the scene after Adam's given dominion of the earth. And he tries to mess up the whole thing by going to the woman and getting her to doubt what God said.

[9:24] That's verse 2. That's the first thing that you notice there is he gets her to doubt what God said. And that will run all the way throughout Scripture, all the way up until now. If somebody is trying to get you to doubt what God said, you know what spirit they're of.

[9:38] They're of the devil. You know, it's weird nowadays. You hear folks talk about the devil and they keep saying the evil one, the evil one. Hold on a second.

[9:48] You mean Satan? You mean the devil? Why don't you name that sucker, man? Satan. That's him. And now he gets her to doubt the words of God and what the Lord told them to do.

[10:00] And it comes down where she takes the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil. So if you want to get the problem of good and evil and where it originates, it originates with Eve. The Lord tells Adam and Eve not to eat of that tree, but Eve takes of it in verse 6.

[10:15] And then she gives it to her husband, Adam. Now, you know the Lord curses him for this. He curses the devil to go on his belly. He gives the woman pain in childbirth and then puts her underneath the husband.

[10:27] And the husband, Adam, there is going to work for the rest of his life by the sweat of his brow. And death enters into the picture right here. And it's a spiritual death. Their spirit dies.

[10:38] They can no longer have fellowship with God. And look at verse 8, Genesis chapter 3 and verse 8. And when they heard the voice of the Lord God walking in the garden in the cool of the day, and Adam and his wife hid themselves from the presence of the Lord God amongst the trees of the garden.

[10:56] So man starts out in fellowship with God in his very presence. The Lord creates man and he gives him a choice to make. He says, you love me enough to stay away from that tree or you take of that tree.

[11:11] I'm telling you not to take it. Don't take it. That's how you're going to show your love for me is obeying what I tell you to do. Now, of course, that choice is necessary to have love.

[11:23] And the Lord gives him free will and all that. Now come down to verse 22. Genesis chapter 3 and verse 22. And the Lord God said, Behold, the man has become as one of us to know good and evil.

[11:37] And now, lest he put forth his hand and take also the tree of life and eat and live forever. Therefore, the Lord God sent him forth from the garden of Eden to till the ground from whence he was taken. So he drove out the man and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden cherubims and a flaming sword, which turned every way to keep the way of the tree of life.

[11:56] God's judgment there is a judgment in mercy. Because as verse 22 shows you that Adam fell, he lost his relationship with God, he kills his spirit by taking the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, but because he's still in the garden, he has the opportunity to take of the tree of life.

[12:18] And the Lord kicks him out of the garden so he doesn't take of the tree of life. If he would have taken of the tree of life then, he would have lived forever in a fallen state. So God judges him.

[12:31] In his holiness, he says, now, that's not going to be good for you. I'm going to kick you out here for a while. And the tree of life and all that comes back on later. But that's not an immoral God.

[12:43] That's God's judgment on sin. Man's the mess up. Man's the one that messed everything up for you.

[12:54] Man's at fault. For what you consider to be immoral from God, that is man's fault. And I know I'm not saying you in here tonight, I don't think necessarily anybody in here would look up to heaven and say, God, you're immoral.

[13:09] You know, I think everybody's been here throughout the week, so I'm hoping you're saved. But those of you that are, I know that you're not going to shake your fist at heaven, but when these atheists try to drum up an argument about God's immorality, they're looking at God and saying, why doesn't he put up with my sin?

[13:28] And because he won't put up with my sin, he's immoral. That's what they're saying. Now, I'll show you this. They always bring up genocide. Do you remember last night in the Dawkins Cliff?

[13:39] He was like, he's a genocidal, patricidal, and then he went on with a bunch of different adjectives. Do you remember that? Here's where they get that from. Look at Leviticus 20. They get it from the nation of Israel.

[13:52] And the nation of Israel is told plenty of times, especially when Joshua takes him into the land, to go in and wipe him out. Wipe him out. Now, the land of Israel is God's land.

[14:03] It's not our land. It's not man's land. It's God's land, and he gave it to Abraham. And so the Lord's looking after that land, and he loves that land over there. And then Moses comes into that burning bush, and he says, take off your shoes, for you're on holy ground.

[14:20] And so the Lord's got a holy piece of dirt over there, and he's looking forward to coming back and setting himself up as king over it. And so when you look at that kind of a thing, you cannot look at it like a man does and say, well, those are humans over there.

[14:34] We should save them all. Well, look here. Look at Leviticus chapter 20. And look at verse 23. Let's pick it up in verse 22.

[14:46] Leviticus 20 and verse 22. So the Lord's looking after the nation of Israel here.

[15:03] And he's telling them, if you'll do what I tell you to do and obey the commandments I've given you to obey, then the land won't spew you out. You'll have a good time of it. And look at verse 23.

[15:14] And ye shall not walk in the manners of the nation which I cast out before you, for they committed all these things, and therefore I abhorred them. But I have said unto you, ye shall inherit their land, and I will give it unto you to possess it, a land that floweth with milk and honey.

[15:30] I am the Lord your God, which have separated you from other people. And you say, what were they doing? Well, Leviticus chapter 20 and verse 1. And just let your eyes run down through that passage.

[15:44] Look at what they're doing. Look at verse 4. They're burning their kids to a calf. They're worshiping Moldak and burning their infants.

[15:57] Look at verse 6. Look at verse 10. Look at verse 11.

[16:11] Look at verse 12. Verse 13. Verse 14. Verse 15. Bestiality. Verse 16.

[16:24] Let your eyes wander all the way down there to 22. God's command to go and wipe those people out is because of the judgment on their sin.

[16:42] Now, it's important, Christian, that you get that. When God acts, he usually acts after a time of patience and he acts in justice. So, when the Lord tells him to go in and wipe these people out, especially with Joshua coming in there as a military commander, he's doing it as a judgment on their sin.

[17:02] Now, that's a misunderstanding of holiness. Now, that's a misunderstanding of holiness. Now, Webster defines holiness as, or holy as, not that Webster's the authority, but to just give you some English definitions here.

[17:16] Like I said, Webster's the authority, but there's a little bit of holiness. Like I said, Webster's not your authority, but there's a little bit of background on what holy means.

[17:30] Now, how in the world are you going to understand a God like that? You and I can't, Christian. Can you imagine him being pure with what you thought today?

[17:47] No. I can't either. Sometimes I have mercy on my kids, you know, and they should get a whooping, you know. I say, well, I'll show some mercy now.

[17:58] Why? Because the Lord showed me mercy. I should be dead and in hell. If for nothing else but the dirty thoughts.

[18:10] They're not even turned to actions yet. It's what goes on in my mind. And so God's holiness demands justice. And if God were to just forgive sin without a payment, that'd make him like you.

[18:23] If there is no payment for that sin, there is no justice done, then God is not holy. There has to be a payment.

[18:37] There has to be a consequence. There has to be justice. And so, especially in the Old Testament, when you see God getting genocidal, don't worry about what the atheist says about that kind of a thing.

[18:48] He's trying to take a dig at God because he thinks God ought to be like him. And God ain't like him. And God's not like you or me either. He's holy. And that holiness demands justice.

[19:01] And so these two kind of run together. If you can get the first one down, then you'll understand the answer to the second one. Now, Hitchens kind of hopped on this bandwagon and he was all about, now, if God was so powerful, then why did he have to torture his kid and send him to hell and all that kind of stuff like that?

[19:18] Couldn't he have just forgiven sin and all that nonsense? Listen, God's power is not his highest attribute. The problem with us as people and humans and our mindset is man thinks that power is the ultimate attribute.

[19:35] Now, you know that, folks, by just watching the strongman competitions. What in God's green earth possesses a man to go out and try to deadlift a Volkswagen?

[19:48] Who, like, grows up 10, 11, 12 years old like, Volkswagen? I'm going to deadlift you. That's what I want to do.

[20:01] Well, nobody if they're sane. But you see them out there doing it. Eddie Hall had, for a while, the deadlift record for a little over 1,000 pounds. It was a 500-kilo deadlift.

[20:12] That would make that 2.24, so you're looking at an almost 1,100-pound deadlift. And so this guy is, like, 5'5", 5'6", somewhere in there, Scottish guy.

[20:23] And this guy is eating, like, 17,000 calories a day and, like, lifting heavy all the time and breaking bones and destroying his shoulder and killing his knee and all this.

[20:34] Why? Just to get a record for the heaviest deadlift. Deadlift. You see the rice burners out here on the highway, man. That Honda pulls up next to you and it's got the muffler from AutoZone, you know, and it's got the cold air intake from AutoZone, you know, and it's got the new tires.

[20:52] It's got the little purple lug nuts and all that kind of stuff, the go-fast lug nuts, you know what I mean? What is that? That's just a bunch of people that are obsessed with power. Look at your presidency and look at all that stuff going on there.

[21:04] Listen, folks, regardless of what you think about it, they'll tell you whatever they need to tell you to get in office. Why? Because they want the power.

[21:18] When you start getting into that kind of stuff, you're real close to the devil, man, because he's the god of this world. Now, what does that show you? Man's obsessed with power. Man is obsessed with it. So much so that if a husband thinks his wife doesn't respect him well enough, he'll devolve to hitting her.

[21:37] Yeah. Yeah. Men hit their wives. Why? Because they don't think they have the power over their wife. They beat their kids to have power. That's all that is.

[21:50] Man gets disrespected. He acts out in anger. That's not God. God's highest attribute is his holiness. His holiness balances every other attribute.

[22:04] To be holy is to be perfectly pure, immaculate, and complete. You know what that also means? That means that God is balanced. Perfectly balanced.

[22:17] He's perfectly whole. And so you have, you've got God the Father and Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit and that trinity. They are perfectly balanced and perfectly whole.

[22:28] That means they have a perfect hatred. You get to read in there and he says, Esau, have I hated? And Jacob, have I loved?

[22:40] And so he's got a perfect hatred and he's got a perfect love. Now you get these two out of balance and you don't have God. You've got man.

[22:52] The grace crowd is all about this side. Love him, love him, love him, love him, love him, love him. Accept him, accept him, accept him, accept him, accept him, accept him, accept him, accept him. God says, okay, what are their sins?

[23:05] So when you get saved, you get saved because Jesus Christ paid for your sins. See? There was a payment made on this side of God, so now you can have this side of God.

[23:18] That's how you get in. The lost world wants to get in without this side of God. That's not God. That's not the God of the Bible. That may be the Catholic God.

[23:30] That may be the Lutheran God. That may be the Grace Fest God. But that's not the God of the Bible. So when you're coming throughout your Old Testament, there's some heavy stuff back there. And this is one of them.

[23:41] You do see, you know, it could have been a couple million people wiped out. Just look at the flood, man. Come back to Genesis chapter 6. Look at that. Look at how many people he wipes out here.

[23:55] Genesis chapter 6. And look at verse 1. And it came to pass when men began to multiply on the face of the earth, and daughters were born unto them, that the sons of God saw the daughters of men, that they were fair.

[24:09] And they took them wives of all which they chose. And the Lord said, My spirit shall always strive with man, for that he also is flesh. Yet his days shall be 120 years. There were giants in the earth. Look at verse 5. And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.

[24:24] And it repented the Lord that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him in his heart. So you know what he said? I'm going to destroy them. Wipe them out. Why? They start messing with those genes and all that kind of stuff going on.

[24:37] Noah, look at Noah. Look at verse 8. But Noah found grace in the eyes of the Lord. These are the generations of Noah. Noah was a just man and perfect in his generations. You run that word generations, and it's how things originate and how they pop up.

[24:52] And so Noah keeps himself pure from that ungodly line coming down from heaven and all that kind of stuff going on. So that he finds grace in the eyes of the Lord, but the whole earth, everybody on it, their imaginations are wicked, evil.

[25:07] And it hurts the Lord's heart, and he says, all right, wipe them out. I'll save Noah and his family, and we'll start again. That's judgment on sin. And you need to get that down, Christian.

[25:21] Don't be surprised when they bring it up, but that's the God of the Bible. No. And so that will also answer, and I'll look at a couple other scriptures on this, but that will also answer number two.

[25:33] Why did Jesus Christ have to die? They think God is immoral because they don't understand his holiness. His holiness is his highest attribute, not his power. And because he is holy, Jesus Christ had to die.

[25:47] Now look at, we're going to run a couple here, but come over to Genesis chapter 3, where we're just back there, and look at verse 21. We started in verse 22.

[25:58] But when Adam and Eve commit this sin of taking of the tree of knowledge of good and evil, and they sin against God, and sin enters into the world according to Romans, and death enters into the world according to Romans, when that happens, now the Lord's got to kill an animal and cover him up.

[26:13] Look at verse 21, Genesis chapter 3, verse 21. Unto Adam also, and to his wife did the Lord God make coats of skins and clothe them. So before he sends them out, he sends them out clothed, but he's got to shed blood, and he's got to give them the coats of an animal.

[26:30] Now I would agree with the guess that that's a lamb. The typology is pretty good there, but he doesn't say he killed a lamb. The typology is pretty good there. And so there's your first blood shed on earth, right there, Genesis 3, 21.

[26:46] The first blood shed on earth is to cover sin. And so you get that all the way throughout Scripture. The Bible is a very, very bloody book.

[26:57] And there are some passages in there that I like, because they're bloody, and because I'm a man, all right? So you just like some of that stuff. But Scripture is very bloody, and the Bible is very bloody.

[27:07] Come over to Romans chapter 5. Now, if we're being honest, folks, Jesus Christ didn't have to actually die.

[27:19] Like, God could have just wiped out the earth and started again with a different Adam and a different Eve and gave them free will, and it might have worked out that way. I mean, he could have done that.

[27:31] But he chose not to, and he chose to set in motion a plan that they had from the beginning of the world, or before the foundations of the world, rather. And so they, Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who is the Word, made flesh, the Son of God, God manifests in the flesh.

[27:46] Romans chapter 5. I don't think I told you that. Romans chapter 5. They follow through with a plan to redeem mankind if they'll take it. Now look at Romans chapter 5, and look at verse 12.

[27:57] Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned. Now you inherit your sin nature from Adam.

[28:10] You come out of the womb, you know, and you're innocent and all that kind of, you don't know good and evil and all that, but you come out of the womb and you automatically start lying. Come on, I remember back when you guys had kids and they were like, they get to be about the age where they start taking good naps about two hours apart, you know, two hours, two hours, two hours.

[28:30] But then they get to a point where it's like they don't want to sleep anymore. They're still not beyond the age of innocence, but they're like, I don't want to go to bed, you know. And what happens? You lay them down and they start screaming bloody murder.

[28:43] They're fed. They got a clean diaper and you've got the wave sounds going and it's dark in their room. Okay, but you put them down on that mat and they start wailing.

[28:55] You run in there like the devil's got a hold of them, hanging them over hell. You run in there and try to save them from all that kind of stuff. And as soon as you pick that kid up, Oh, Google, God, God, I'm so happy to be awake and just take me out there into the living room and we'll be fine.

[29:11] That kid's lying like a Persian rug, man. He just wants you to pick him up. He just doesn't want to go to bed. He doesn't really, like, he's not computing that with evil or that he's going to go ahead and sin.

[29:25] I'm going to go ahead and sin now. But he's not hurt. He's not upset. Well, he is upset a little bit, but he's acting like he just got a snake bite or something like that. What's the kid doing? He's lying.

[29:35] You come out of the womb like that. And you get to be a little bit older. You get to be a little bit smarter. Just a little bit. And Dr. Ruckman would always say about his kids, they got to a point where they say, Daddy, can we have some ice cream?

[29:50] And then, Daddy, we need some ice cream. Well, I've got a five-year-old and a seven-year-old, and I know what that's like. And I'm a five-year-old, and nothing wrong with him. But with my five-year-old, he's now starting to get logic.

[30:02] And so he'll ask for something, but it's always with a clause. And now, Dad, if we get this done, then can we also do this thing that I want to do over here that you said no to yesterday?

[30:14] You know, that kind of a thing. And so then you start to get really good about sinning and all that stuff. You get your attitudes. Well, listen, folks, you came out of the womb like that. You inherited that from Adam. Look at Genesis chapter 1 and Genesis chapter 5.

[30:28] Look at this. Look at Genesis chapter 1. And look at what the Lord says in Genesis chapter 1 and verse 26. And for some reason, the atheist stops reading in Genesis 1.

[30:41] I don't know what his deal is. But if he's going to read the Bible, he stopped in Genesis 1. Because they all say this. We're all made in the image of God, aren't we? They will always use that.

[30:53] And they get that from Genesis 1, 26. Look at this. And God said, let us make man in our image after our likeness. So they always go there. Oh, we're all made in the image of God. We're all brethren.

[31:04] Okay. Well, after Adam and Eve sinned, look at Genesis chapter 5. Genesis chapter 5 and verse 3. And Adam lived in 130 years and begat a son in his own likeness after his image.

[31:18] So here's what you got going on. The image of God is Jesus Christ. And then, so if you want to get, you want to understand what's going on there. Jesus Christ is the expressed image of God.

[31:33] God manifests in the flesh. So God's got a body, a soul, and a spirit. And Jesus Christ, expressed image. So he makes Adam. He makes him with a body that's formed out of the ground. He gives him a soul when he breathes life into him.

[31:45] And he's got a spirit. And that's that air coming through. He's got those three parts. But when he sins against God and he takes that fruit off that tree of knowledge of good and evil, Adam kills that side of him.

[31:58] He's got a dead spirit. So when he starts propagating, he's propagating seed after his own image, which is just a body and a soul and a dead spirit. He's not propagating people like God anymore.

[32:12] The spirit is dead. There is no access or fellowship to God anymore. There is sin in his body now. So when he has children, that's how they're being born, with just a body and a soul.

[32:24] They're not being born with that spirit anymore. So when you come to Genesis 5, 3, Adam lived 130 years and we got a son in his own likeness after his image and called his name Seth. That shows you that we are not made in the image of God anymore.

[32:36] You are not born in God's image. Now, as far as like being made like a man and that form, you know, having a head, shoulders and all that lined up. Yeah, OK. But you don't have a body, soul and spirit anymore.

[32:47] You're born with that dead spirit. And so come to Ephesians chapter 2. This is your state before salvation. Ephesians chapter 2. The Bible can call you dead while you're walking around living.

[33:01] Why? Because you've got a dead spirit. Look at Ephesians chapter 2 and verse 1. And you hath he quickened, that is to be made alive, who were dead in trespasses and sins.

[33:14] Wherein in time past you walked according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that now worketh in the children of disobedience. And that's the way you and I walked before we got saved. And you were walking around with that dead spirit.

[33:26] And you had a spirit of disobedience. Disobedience to God. So that's how we are now. And so you inherit that sin nature from Adam.

[33:37] Now the Lord down through scripture has always had a means of fellowship. Fellowship. So he's had a means of fellowship. You get over to Noah and Abraham and he fellowships with those men and he calls them out and leads them out.

[33:52] And then you get to Moses and he gives them the law. And from the law on, that's the means of fellowship. Is the law. That's the covenant between God and Israel. And if somebody wants to get to God, they've got to become a Jewish proselyte and they've got to start obeying the law.

[34:08] And so if you want to have fellowship with God in the Old Testament, you had to follow the Ten Commandments and then Exodus, Numbers, Leviticus, and Deuteronomy, all that stuff. And if you did that, then the Lord had fellowship with you from the Holy of Holies there through the high priest and that set up there.

[34:24] That was a means of fellowship. But come to Galatians chapter 3. And in Galatians chapter 3, look at what he says here about this law.

[34:35] Galatians chapter 3. Look at verse 19. Wherefore then serveth the law.

[34:46] It was added because of transgressions, till the seed should come to whom the promise was made, and it was ordained by angels in the hand of a mediator. Now, a mediator is not a mediator of one, but God is one.

[34:57] Is the law then against the promises of God? God forbid. For if there had been a law given which could have given life, verily righteousness should have been by the law. But the scripture hath concluded all under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe.

[35:12] But before faith came, we were kept under the law. Shut up unto the faith which should afterwards be revealed. Wherefore the law was our schoolmaster to bring us unto Christ, that we might be justified by faith.

[35:26] But after that faith has come, we are no longer under a schoolmaster. All right, a schoolmaster is supposed to teach you something. And being underneath that law before Jesus Christ came, what was it supposed to teach you? Come back to Romans chapter 7.

[35:40] Romans chapter 7. Romans chapter 7. A pretty famous portion of scripture here, of course, going over the fact that Paul can't do what he wants to do, and that is doing right.

[35:52] And then when he wants to do something wrong and he doesn't want to do it, he ends up doing it anyway. But he's fighting his flesh. He says, Who shall deliver me from the body of this death? And this passage here shows you, look at Romans chapter 7, and look at verse 7.

[36:05] What shall we say then? Is the law sin? God forbid. Nay, I had not known sin, but by the law. For I had not known lust, except the law had said, Thou shalt not covet.

[36:17] But sin, taking occasion by the commandment, wrought in me a manner of concupiscence, all manner of concupiscence. For without the law, sin was dead. For I was alive without the law once. But when the commandment came, sin revived, and I died.

[36:30] And the commandment which was ordained to life, I found to be unto death. For sin, taking occasion by the commandment, deceived me, and by it slew me. Wherefore the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just and good.

[36:43] Was then that which is good made death unto me? God forbid. But sin, that it might appear sin. Working death in me by that which is good, that sin by the commandment which might, sorry, by the commandment, might become exceeding sinful.

[36:59] You know what he's telling you there? That law is given to show you, you cannot keep the law. It's to show you you're a sinner.

[37:10] The Old Testament, he gives those ten commandments, we'll just stick with the ten commandments. He gives them the ten commandments, it's that individual law to the individual Jew, and he says, thou shalt not lie. Thou shalt not commit adultery.

[37:24] Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, with all thy mind, with all thy soul. Thou shalt not make any graven image. What is that? That's a covenant between God and the people of Israel, the nation of Israel there. You keep these, then we fellowship.

[37:35] You break them, we don't fellowship. Now for you and I, it's to show you that you're a sinner, that you can't keep it, that you're not as holy as God is, and you never will be.

[37:46] So that law shows you you're a sinner on your way to hell. And James tells you if you break one, then you're guilty of the whole law. So okay, if you've ever lied, how many have ever lied in here?

[37:59] I shouldn't have raised my hand. No. If you've ever lied in here, you are guilty of the whole law. And so if you've ever told your mom a lie the first time you took a dollar out of her purse, then you are guilty of not loving God.

[38:16] That's what he said. You are guilty of adultery. You are guilty of lying. You see, once you're guilty, you're guilty. And so Jesus Christ comes down, and look at, pick it up in Ephesians chapter 2.

[38:31] We were just there. Ephesians 2 and Colossians 2. Ephesians chapter 2 and Colossians 2. And so once you're guilty, Christian, before a holy God, there has to be a payment.

[38:42] And under the law in the Old Testament, they had sacrifices, and we'll get to that in Hebrews chapter 10. There were sacrifices that were offered, but they could never take away sin. It was just a way to get fellowship restored, but they still had sacrifices with blood.

[38:55] Look at Ephesians 2 and Colossians 2. Pick it up, Ephesians 2 first. And verse 13. Ephesians 2, verse 13. But now in Christ Jesus, ye who sometimes were far off, are made nigh by the blood of Christ.

[39:10] For he is our peace, who hath made both one, and hath broken down the middle wall of partition between us, having abolished, and now watch it now, in his flesh, the enmity, even the law of commandments, contained in ordinances, for to make in himself of twain one new man, so making peace.

[39:29] Jesus Christ takes away the enmity that is carried with the law against you and I. Look at what I tell you. Colossians chapter 2. Colossians chapter 2.

[39:40] And look at verse 13. Colossians chapter 2 and verse 13. And in Colossians chapter 2, verse 13, he says this, You being dead in your sins, in the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses.

[39:57] How? Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross.

[40:10] You see that? Sinner, there's a law against you. You stand before God, and you're going to try to get by that law, you are going right to hell.

[40:23] Jesus Christ came down to fulfill that law. So he lived without sin. And then when he died and became sin, God put that law against him, and he paid for your sin, so that now, if you'll take Jesus Christ for free, you don't have to stand against that law.

[40:39] You get the righteousness which is by faith, according to Romans chapter 10. You now no longer have to worry about the righteousness which is of the law. That is, he that doeth these things shall live by them. They're paid for.

[40:52] Done away. That's how you get eternal life. You don't have to stand before God, and God get that law out and say, now, see, now this time over here you lied. Guilty.

[41:03] And then worry about going to hell? Jesus Christ took it on the cross. So, Jesus Christ had to die, or else every man, woman, and child on this planet would be destined for hell.

[41:16] You talk about a Calvinistic approach, there's your atheist. Well, why did Jesus Christ have to die? You want to go to hell, bud? Is that what you want? Then Jesus Christ had to die, or you ain't getting by it.

[41:31] So, he dies, Jesus Christ dies, and now God the Father, if you'll take Jesus Christ, will give you eternal life through his son, and then when God the Father looks at you, he doesn't see a broken law, he sees his son, Jesus Christ.

[41:42] That was God's holiness that demanded that payment. Because if he would have just forgiven sin, he'd be just like you.

[41:56] And so, Jesus Christ comes down, and you see him praying in the Garden of Gethsemane, and he says, nevertheless, not my will, but thine be done. And so, Jesus Christ submits himself to the will of the Father, and the will of the Father was for him to become sin, and take your sin, and go preach to the saints, and the captives down there in hell, drop your sin off, and carry captivity captive, and pay the sin debt with his own blood.

[42:23] Look at Hebrews chapter 9. Look at Hebrews chapter 9. Now listen, this, this, okay, I just don't know how many folks think about it like this, but if you don't have a perfect sacrifice, okay, I was going to read the passage, I'll quote it.

[42:43] We'll get to it in a second. Hebrews chapter 9, and look at this, verse 22. Hebrews 9 and verse 22. And almost all things are by the law purged with blood, and without shedding of blood there is no remission.

[42:56] It was therefore necessary that the pattern of things in the heavens should be purified with these, but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ is not entering into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us.

[43:12] Look at verse 26. For then must he often have suffered since the foundation of the world, but now once in the end of the world hath he appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself.

[43:28] And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment, so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many, and unto them that look for him shall they appear the second time without sin unto salvation.

[43:39] Look at chapter 10 and look at verse 1. For the law, having a shadow of good things to come and not the very image of the things, can never with those sacrifices which they offered year by year continually make the comers thereunto perfect.

[43:53] For then would they not have ceased to be offered, because that the worshippers once purged should have no more conscience of sins. But in those sacrifices in the Old Testament there is a remembrance again made of sins every year, for it is not possible that the blood of bulls and goats should take away sins.

[44:10] Wherefore, when he cometh into the world, he saith, Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not, but a body hast thou prepared me in burnt offerings and sacrifices for sin. Thou hast had no pleasure. Then said I, Lo, I come, in the volume of the book it is written, of me to do thy will, O God.

[44:25] Above when he said, Sacrifice and offering and burnt offerings and offering for sin, thou wouldest not, neither hadst pleasure therein which are offered by the law. Then said he, Lo, I come to do thy will, O God, he taketh away the first that he may establish the second.

[44:40] By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. Friend, every priest standeth daily ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices which can never take away sins.

[44:52] But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down on the right hand of God. Jesus Christ was the perfect sacrifice.

[45:03] And look at John chapter 1 and what the Bible calls him. In Hebrews here, he keeps making reference to that sacrifice, that sacrifice, sacrifice, sacrifice. Why? Because that blood has to purge away sin, but the blood of bulls and goats can't do it.

[45:16] You need something better. You need something a little higher than that. A bull and a goat might be innocent, but you need something holy. And so in John chapter 1, pick it up in verse 29, look at what he says here.

[45:27] The next day John see Jesus coming unto him and saith, Behold the Lamb, the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world. And so God the Father laid Jesus Christ down on the cross of Calvary and offered him like a lamb, a pure and holy lamb to make a pure and holy payment for the sins of the world.

[45:51] That's the only way that that law can be taken away from you and I. It's a holy payment made to fulfill it. And so when these guys start talking, well why do you have to kill his son?

[46:03] Listen stupid, just read the rest of the Bible. But really folks, the problem is this, is that God is not a God of investigation, He's a God of revelation. The Bible tells you that the natural man receiveth not the things that are of God because they're spiritually discerned.

[46:19] He has to have the Holy Spirit. So Hebrews 11, chapter 11, verse 6 tells you, it is impossible to please God for he that cometh to God must believe that He is.

[46:33] That's the first step. And so if they won't concede any of that kind of a stuff, then the Lord's not going to deal with them. They first have to believe He's there. But when you're talking to these folks and you're showing them these answers, show them.

[46:47] Listen, Jesus Christ had to die or else you would still have to go to hell. There's another way now. And Jesus Christ designed the way, the truth, and the life.

[46:58] So He's another option. So if you don't want to go to hell, you take Jesus Christ. And the payment was made and so He'll give you free eternal life. But that's why He had to die because there's a law against you. And a perfect and holy sacrifice is the only way to fulfill it.

[47:13] Get it off of you if you'll take Jesus Christ. But it's all based on God's holiness. And if God wasn't holy, well then He wouldn't be God, number one.

[47:24] But number two, then Jesus Christ would have had to die. He'd just be like you and me and just forgive everybody. And then He'd take part in your sin because He's forgiven you of it with no justice and no payment to clear it away. So all that is is just somebody who they could have been saved at an early age and then just got away from God and went off into the world.

[47:48] But all it is is a straw dummy argument. They're grasping at straws to make God seem like He's this evil, narcissistic, malevolent being up there that just wants to make man's existence horrible.

[48:00] But really all that the truth is is that they want to revel in their sin and not feel like they're going to be judged for it. And so if you can take the judgment off the conscience, well that's how they do it.

[48:13] Try to get around it like that. Well if God's so powerful and so loving, see, then why do you have to kill His kid? That's why. That's why. And it took 5.8 Great English and a Bible that you could get from, you could still get a King James Bible from a dollar store by the way, so you can go to Dollar Tree and pay a dollar for it and you can read it.

[48:34] But that just shows you that they don't want to read it. Listen, I'm, the Lord Jesus Christ did one of the greatest, well did the greatest thing for me after my salvation and that was confirming the King James Bible for me.

[48:48] He speaks to me out of that book. But do you realize, folks, that God's no respecter of persons and He leaves that book for common man to find if man wants to find it?

[49:04] Oh, the grace and mercy and the depth and the riches of the knowledge of God. Here, the whole body of absolute truth that touches on the beginning and the end and everything in between and He puts it in the printed word and gives it out for a dollar.

[49:20] And if you go to church, they'll give it to you for free. It's there if they want it, they just don't want it. And now, with the generations coming in behind Dawkins and Hitchens and all these guys, they're going to have the same problems and they won't have had somebody answer them.

[49:39] So, Lord willing, you'll be able to answer them. Number one, God's not immoral, He's holy. And there has to be justice for sin. And so, He carries it out. And those nations in the Old Testament, when they start pulling that genocidal stuff on, you take Leviticus chapter 20 and show them that's what they were doing against God.

[50:00] So, He judges them for it. That proves His holiness. And then the second one is Jesus Christ has to die because God is holy and He demands a holy payment.

[50:11] So, if God was going to love you enough to give you a way out of hell, it had to be done by Himself. He's the only one who could have done it. Nobody else was holy enough to do it because if you break one law, you're guilty of all of it.

[50:25] And so, there is no stacking up of righteousness. You know, you won't make it. And so, the last two, the number three there, the problem of good and evil, that one normally comes up like why do bad things happen to good people.

[50:37] And this is kind of, it's a good kind of succession here is that this one's based on God's holiness and the same thing here but we've already touched on why this one happens. Bad things to good people is that you've got to really redefine what you think is good people.

[50:53] First of all, look at Romans chapter 3. Romans chapter 3. Galatians told you that the scriptures concluded all under sin and pick it up in Romans chapter 3.

[51:05] In Romans chapter 5, he told you that sin passed upon all men and death by sin and so all men die because they are sinners. Now, look at Romans chapter 3 and look at verse 23.

[51:18] For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Look at Isaiah chapter 64. Look at Isaiah chapter 64.

[51:31] All. All have sinned and come short. Isaiah 64 and look at verse 6. But we are all as an unclean thing and all our righteousnesses are as filthy rags and we all do fade as a leaf and our iniquities like the wind have taken us away.

[51:53] Look at Isaiah chapter 53. Every good thing you can do is nothing but a dirty rag. Isaiah chapter 53 and look at verse 4.

[52:06] Surely he hath borne our griefs and carried our sorrows yet we did esteem him stricken, smitten of God and afflicted but he was wounded for our transgressions.

[52:16] He was bruised for our iniquities. The chastisement of our peace was upon him and with his stripes were healed all. Not some. Not this group over here.

[52:28] All. All. All we like sheep have gone astray. We've turned everyone to his own way and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us. All. There is none good, no not one.

[52:43] And God is no respecter of persons. Every man on this, every man, woman, and child that's ever born, that has ever been born on this planet outside of Jesus Christ has been a dirty, rotten, stinking sinner in God's eyes.

[52:57] Man thinks he's good because he's like other men. God looks at the lost man and he sees a worm headed for hell. He sees somebody who's broken his law, somebody who's a sinner.

[53:11] No access to him, a child of disobedience, a child of the devil, an antichrist, all of those things. That's not good. That's why he tells you there's none good.

[53:23] So when man says why the bad things happen to good people, again, he's trying to make, he's trying to flip the script on God and say God's not doing his job. Listen, folks, we've already been through it tonight. Adam brought sin into this world.

[53:36] Not God. Adam did. In fact, it was Eve first, but that's a sermon for another time. Eve first, then Adam. Adam brings sin in.

[53:48] You want to lay a fault at somebody's feet, lay it at whose fault it is. And Adam, by free will of choice, takes to that tree of knowledge of good and evil and proves that he loves his wife more than he loves God.

[53:58] Sin enters into the world. And so you want to make that point. Show him Genesis chapter 3. That's Adam's fault. And then show him Romans chapter 5.

[54:09] That's Adam's fault. Let's go back to Romans chapter 5 and finish that passage out and then look over it. I think it'll be 1 Corinthians to show you. Yeah, it'll be 1 Corinthians 15. Watch what he says there, but we'll go to Romans 5 first.

[54:21] And he says this in verse 12. Wherefore, as by one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, car accidents, cancer, gunshots, war, murders, molestations, rape, all that kind of stuff.

[54:43] Adam's fault. All right? And death by sin, and so death passed upon all men for that all have sinned. For until the law, sin was in the world, but sin is not imputed when there is no law.

[54:54] Nevertheless, death reigned from Adam to Moses even over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam's transgression, who is the figure of him that was to come. But not as the offense, so also is the free gift.

[55:06] For if through the offense of one many be dead, much more the grace of God and the gift by grace which is by one man, Jesus Christ, hath abounded unto many. Look at 1 Corinthians chapter 15.

[55:19] 1 Corinthians chapter 15. And 1 Corinthians 15 and verse 45. 1 Corinthians 15 and verse 45.

[55:35] And so it is written, the first man, Adam, was made a living soul. The last Adam was made a quickening spirit. Jesus Christ comes in and he fulfills what Adam, or he restores what Adam lost and he quickens that spirit for you and I.

[55:52] But it's all charged with Adam. It always goes back to Adam. Adam is the one that brought sin into the world. So if you want to lay fault with the evil happening to your supposed good people over here, lay it at Adam's fault.

[56:04] Sorry, at Adam's feet. And then you get to look at Adam's life and here he is. He's got a son and his son beats the brains out of his other son and the first murder was Adam's boys.

[56:20] Imagine living with that on your conscience. Imagine looking at Cain and Abel and, you know, well, not looking at them, but Cain comes in from offering his sacrifice and he's cleaning up his hands there.

[56:31] He's got that towel there and he tosses it off before he gets to dad's house. He walks into Adam's door there and he sits down and he's like, where's your brother Abel? Oh, I don't know. It comes to find out later on about 10 years at Christmas time, it comes out that Cain killed Abel and then here it is, Adam sitting there and he's thinking back to the garden.

[56:51] And I bet you that boy got a hold of that thing real fast. I bet you he understood right then and there the gravity of what he had done. That's Adam's fault. Don't make that God's fault.

[57:04] If you want to make that God's fault, then you're an idiot. But then it comes out like this. It comes out, it'll come out either that way or it'll come out like, okay, but God knew it was going to happen and he still allowed it to go on.

[57:20] And again, that goes back to his holiness. If God were to create Adam without free will, he's creating a robot. All right?

[57:30] To have a relationship, you have to have choice. If you don't have choice, you do not have a relationship. So here God is, he creates Adam in that garden and then he gives him a choice.

[57:43] He tells him, Adam, you can do whatever you want, man, but just don't touch that tree. No, he says, don't eat of that tree. That one over there, don't eat that one.

[57:55] Now who knows, about a thousand years into it, he might have allowed Adam to finally eat it after he revealed enough of himself to Adam. Who knows how that thing would have played out. But the Lord imparts to Adam free will choice.

[58:07] And then he gives him the choice. You can do whatever you want and we'll be in fellowship as long as you don't eat of that tree. But the day you eat of that tree, you're going to die. And then they go on.

[58:19] And the Lord doesn't tell you how much time went in between that conversation and when Eve takes hold of that tree. There could have been many years in between that. We don't know.

[58:30] But you get to look into that thing and explain that to an atheist, that would probably be the first time they've ever heard something like that and thought about relationships. And you do that nowadays.

[58:43] You don't want to, you know, you fellas looking, well, I don't know, how many of you are looking for a wife right now? I guess we got one guy over here. Are you looking for a wife, brother? I don't know. Okay, so we got two in here.

[58:55] There we go. Well, I was about to say, now you fellas looking for a wife in here, but like everybody in here is almost married, you know? So it's like, what's that? Yeah, come on, man. You don't want some, you don't want some girl that ain't got a brain in her head?

[59:08] Now, unfortunately, that's what women are stuck with is guys don't have brains in their head, but still, you know? You don't want to find out that your wife doesn't love you and, you know, if she loves you, she chose to love you. She chose you against everybody else.

[59:22] And that's how that thing plays out. That was a test of love back in the garden. That's what that was. And the Lord's telling Adam, if you don't do that, then we'll be in fellowship, but if you do that, we won't.

[59:32] And what he's testing is whether or not Adam loves him more than his wife. And, of course, he fails the test. But that's how that, that's how that third one will come out in two ways.

[59:44] Either they'll say, why do bad things happen to good people? Or how come God let it slide when he knew it was going to happen? You could just answer him like this. Okay, yeah, God knew it was going to happen and it did, but then he fixed it in Jesus Christ.

[59:56] Now what are you going to do about it? You could just do it like that. Okay, so God knew it was going to happen, but then he gave him the law to keep and he tells you in Ezekiel chapter 18 that if you keep the law, even if you were wicked and you turned from your wickedness, then if you die in your righteousness, then you go to Abraham's bosom.

[60:11] So there you go. He's always had a way out. Give him that one. That'll shake him up a little bit. But then we get to the last one, number four, which God?

[60:22] Now, if you can get through all three of these and you're still engaged in conversation and they're still talking and all that kind of stuff and you haven't like obliterated the opportunity to witness yet just by getting angry, then they'll get to this point where they say, okay, fine, I can see all these points, but here we got a billion different gods.

[60:39] Now which one do I choose from? And that's an easy answer. Look at Isaiah chapter 46. Now, I showed you that clip last night and Ben Stein, he's talking to Dawkins and Dawkins reads off what he says and then Ben Stein returns the question to him.

[60:59] He says, well, what about the God that's all loving and kind and merciful like the modern God? That ain't the right way to handle that. He was just fishing for answers, but the right answer to which God you follow is Isaiah 46.

[61:13] Isaiah 46 and verse 9. Isaiah 46 and verse 9, remember the former things of old for I am God and there is none else. I am God and there is none like me.

[61:25] It's a bold claim, isn't it? Now, of course, it's true, but you know why it's true? Because of verse 10. Declaring the end from the beginning and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying my counsel shall stand and I will do all my pleasure.

[61:45] So you want to know the God to follow? The God that can tell you history before it happens. The God of prophecy. That's the God you follow.

[61:56] You get to read in that Koran. I still have not been able to make it through one time. I get a little ways in and those sirs are so backwards, man. So it's just not nice reading material and it gets boring, all right?

[62:06] But you get into that thing and it's nothing but wipe out the infidels and like you can have this many wives. There's no prophecy in the thing.

[62:18] It's just that they don't agree with you, kill them and then amass a bunch of wives. That's what it boils down to. Now, maybe there might be more in there, but as far as I can tell, that's all there is. There's no prophecy in Joseph Smith.

[62:30] There's no prophecy in the Pope. There's no prophecy in Muhammad. There's no prophecy in Buddha. Here's something interesting. If you ever get onto an army base, do kind of a study of your own and if you ever talk to veterans, keep this in mind as you're talking to them, but find out how many of them, when they get out of the service, if they've ever seen combat, if they've ever seen combat, find out how many of them went from being either atheist or Catholic to being Hinduistic.

[63:01] You know why they do that? It's because they cannot assuage the problems in their minds. They can't get over the problem in their mind of what they did at war. What they do at war, somebody's got to do.

[63:15] They go fight and kill and all that kind of a stuff. You start taking lives. Well, the only way to get around that, to get peace from all that kind of a stuff for them, is go and be a Hindu. Go and be a Buddhist.

[63:27] Where then you start talking about inner peace and nirvana and cleansing yourself of all your bad karma and all that kind of a stuff. That's just something to watch out for. I've noticed that as you're talking to these veteran guys, you start asking them what they are and what they believe in.

[63:38] Almost all of them are Hinduistic or Buddhist, if they're not atheist. But you get in there and you get that kind of a thing and you watch and you show them that if they get to the point where they start asking which God, you show them Isaiah 46, 9, and 10.

[63:52] And you say, okay, show me any other God but the God of the Bible that can tell you history before it happens. Watch how good the Lord is. Look at verse 10. He said, declaring the end from the beginning, right?

[64:04] Okay, come back to Genesis chapter 3. Now, I loved doing this on the Navy base down in Pensacola. This was one of my favorites. I'd go to Isaiah 46, 9, and 10 and then I'd show them this. And in Genesis chapter 3, look at verse 14.

[64:20] And the Lord God said unto the serpent, because thou hast done this, thou art cursed above all cattle and above every beast of the field and upon thy belly shalt thou go and thus shalt thou eat all the days of thy life.

[64:31] And I will put enmity between thee and the woman and between thy seed and her seed and it, sorry, it shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel. Now watch, this is, this is, this is great, man.

[64:45] This is, this is the Lord right here. Now, if you're just reading that and you weren't paying attention, you just blew by something that'll blow your mind, man. And I, I'm watching the guys' reactions when they got this.

[64:56] You'd always have to ask them questions to get them thinking about what they just read. But did you just see what he just said? Verse 15, and I will put enmity between thee and the woman. Okay, so he's talking to the devil.

[65:07] Here we have the two. You got the devil there, the serpent, and then you've got the woman. All right, so he's talking to the devil there. And he says, I'll put enmity between thy seed and her seed.

[65:20] Who carries the seed? Generally speaking, who carries the seed? Come on. And it takes about them that long to get it too. Like, the man dies.

[65:34] Yes, you're right. The man carries the seed. Man equals the seed. Okay, there you go. Right there. That's how that works out. But the Lord said, her seed. Now watch.

[65:45] He tells you the seed's going to be a man. Look at the passage. Look at verse 15. It shall bruise thy head and thou shalt bruise his heel. So here the woman has a seed and it's a man.

[66:03] There's your virgin birth. In Genesis 3, 15. And what did he tell you in Isaiah 46? He's declaring the end from the beginning.

[66:15] What did he tell you in the New Testament with Paul? By him all things consist. For thy pleasure they are and were created. And Jesus Christ is going to come back and get that throne. Why?

[66:25] Because it begins and ends with Jesus Christ. Then, of course, I take them over to Daniel chapter 9, show them the prophecy of the Messiah coming. and show them the 483 years and how that works out with the timeline coming from Nehemiah's proclamation to go and build Jerusalem and how that works out to the timing of the Messiah in John chapter 1 and Acts chapter 10.

[66:52] They say we found the Messiah and show them that with the dates and timelines. Then I show them Matthew chapter 24 where he says in the end days there will be wars and rumors of war. I show them how in the 20th century and the 21st century has been the hike in wars in mankind's history.

[67:10] Man has been at war for a long time. There have been major wars down through history but you haven't had as many wars until the turn of the 20th century. You've got wars and rumors of wars. And then I show them 2 Timothy chapter 3 with the last days and show them the characteristics of man.

[67:25] Let's go there. Let's go to 2 Timothy chapter 3. Now that was just at the Navy base. I like to do that to them and of course there's a plethora which is the right word a myriad of prophecies to show them but we just couldn't take the time back then and I don't want to take the time now to go through everything and of course I couldn't.

[67:43] We'd have to spend years on all the prophecy and scripture but I try to show them a couple things about Jesus Christ and show them some things in history and then I try to point them to something personal. And the personal one was this in 2 Timothy 3 to show them.

[67:56] And in 2 Timothy 3 look at verse 1. Now Matthew 24 he tells you the end times are going to be close because of these things happening in history. And then in 2 Timothy chapter 3 he tells you the last days are going to be there because of the character of men.

[68:12] Isn't that weird? Here he's giving them history and here he's giving them the character of men. So here what you're about to read look at what he says in verse 1. This know also that in the last days perilous times shall come.

[68:22] So you're talking about the last days. This is 66 AD. Almost 2,000 years ago. Alright. And he says this for men shall be lovers of their own selves. Why do they have cameras on the front of phones?

[68:42] What do they even call the picture that you take with the front camera? A selfie. Lovers of their own selves?

[68:52] You know that that's a fact because every person under the age of 30 points a camera at their face more than likely at least once a week. That's conservative estimates.

[69:07] Yeah. Lovers of their own selves. Covetous. Boasters. Proud. Blasphemers. Disobedient to parents.

[69:19] Unthankful. Unholy. Without natural affection. Truth breakers. False accusers. Let's keep going.

[69:30] Incontinent. Fierce. Despisers of those that are good. Traitors. Heady. High-minded. Lovers of pleasures. More than lovers of God.

[69:44] Having a form of godliness but denying the power thereof. From such turn away. He tells you that's going to be the last days. That's where you live in, Christian.

[69:59] Almost 2,000 years ago. Now, you want to see something crazy? I'll show you something crazy. Watch this one. Man, I hope I wrote this down.

[70:10] Yes. Isaiah 43. Look at this. Look at this. Isaiah 43. Now, man, if this doesn't get you thinking about what you miss every time you read your Bible, then I don't know what will.

[70:27] But I don't know how many times I come through this passage and one time the Lord flips the lights on and I'm like, you have got to be kidding me. I have missed that every time I came through here. Look at this.

[70:38] Isaiah 43. Now, look at verse 11. I love that the Lord does this right here. This is like the...

[70:48] This is like cream of the crop. I love this. Watch. Verse 11. I even I am the Lord and beside me there is no Savior. I have declared and have saved. I have showed when there was no strange God among you.

[71:01] Therefore, you are my witness to say to the Lord that I am God. Present tense, right? I am God. Watch. Yea, before the day was.

[71:14] What's was? Past, present, or future? Watch. Watch. This is crazy. Right, right? That's past, right? Watch what he does. Before the day was, I am he.

[71:32] You missed that if you're going too fast. You know what he just said? I'm out there before time began. I'm before the day was. I'm there right now when he's writing in 714 B.C.

[71:43] So he says, before the day was, I am. You know what he's telling? You know what he's telling Isaiah to write down there? While I'm talking to you, Isaiah, in 714 B.C., if that date is right, I am also before the day was.

[72:02] That's the God you follow. You can find any other book out there that has that in it.

[72:13] And if you do, come find me. But you won't. Here it is, the God outside of time tells man what's going to happen, and it happens down to the T. And so when they ask you, and they start, well, how are we even supposed to know which one, and I've had them do it, how are we supposed to know which one to follow the Muslim God over here, the Hebrew God over here, the Hindu God, Ishmael, and all that kind of stuff over here?

[72:36] Isaiah 46, 9 and 10. Isaiah 43, 13. And then start to show them some prophecy. That God. The God of the Bible.

[72:47] And so that's the four major arguments, and that'll be, if you can show, and like I said, you're going to have to be able to get through a conversation with them. Sometimes as you start opening the Bible to show them things, they'll just get mad and huff off and leave.

[73:01] And that'll show you where their heart is. They don't want the truth. And I've said that a couple times, and I'm telling you, all they want to do is get away from their conscience. That's all that is. The Bible tells you God lights every man that comes into this world, and we didn't get into it tonight, but we got, well, let's take a couple minutes and just look at this, but in that good and evil one, there's another facet of that that comes up, and it's, what about the heathen that have never heard?

[73:25] You ever heard that one before? What of the heathen that have never heard? Coming to Romans chapter 2. And again, just give them Scripture.

[73:38] Give them Scripture. Let the Bible speak for itself, and let the words of God cut to the quick, man. There's something, I've been able to witness by quoting verses to people.

[73:50] That's happened, and somebody's gotten saved. There's nothing wrong with that, and the Lord uses that, all right? When you're quoting the Scripture, the word's going out, it gets into the heart. But have you ever noticed that if you can get somebody to read the verse you're talking about, and you're praying the Holy Spirit's working there, it's like the lights turn on?

[74:06] Have you ever seen that happen? That happens. And so if you can get them, if you can get these atheists out there to look at the Scriptures and read it for themselves, then they can look at it, and the Lord will deal out of this book with their heart.

[74:18] And it's no longer a confrontation between me and him, or me and her, or whatever it is. It's, you have a confrontation with the God of the Bible. Here, let me show you. You know, let me show you. Let me show you. Here's your answer.

[74:28] Here's your answer. Here's your answer. And it always points them back to the book. Back to the book. Back to the book. See? And so in Romans chapter 2, pick it up in verse 13. For not the hearers of the law are just before God, but the doers of the law should be justified.

[74:44] For in the Gentiles, which have not the law, do by nature the things contained in the law, these having not the law are a law unto themselves, which show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience also bearing witness, and their thoughts, the meanwhile accusing or else excusing one another.

[74:58] In the day when God shall judge the secrets of men by Jesus Christ according to my gospel. And so what it looks like is that if somebody has never heard the gospel before and they do not get a chance to trust Jesus Christ by faith, they are judged according to the law of their conscience.

[75:17] And that's what I said before. If they break their conscience and they break one of those laws, then they're not going to make it by the judgment. So that's why missions goes out, and that's why the Lord calls us to go and take the gospel out to the world so they can trust Jesus Christ if they'll take it for free.

[75:32] But if you get over into the, you know, I don't know, they always say like the bush of Papua New Guinea or something, like the bush of Africa or whatever. They come up with these places. And I would be hard-pressed to find one place in the world that hasn't seen a gospel track.

[75:46] Come on, man. Like, really? You think in like 2,000 years of church history there hasn't been a gospel track somewhere? I can't say that for certain, but I'm just saying. But they get into this place where they come up with some area out there, and what about these people?

[76:00] They've never heard the gospel. Hold on a second. The law, the Lord will judge them here according to this. That is, the Gentiles that don't have the law by their conscience.

[76:11] And their conscience, look at verse 15, also bearing witness in their thoughts to meanwhile accusing or excusing. So their conscience will do the business. But listen, folks, there's something else out there that declares.

[76:23] Look at Psalms 19. Look at Psalms 19. And you and I are called to take the gospel to the world, and praise the Lord that the Lord's allowing us as a family to do that.

[76:36] But you folks do that here in Sylmar, and that's why the Lord puts you around people that He does, so that you'll win them. You'll open your mouth for Jesus Christ. If there is such a place existing today that doesn't have the gospel witness, then, you know, I know that countries don't have Bible.

[76:52] I'm just saying, somebody who hasn't heard the gospel before, look at Psalms 19. Look at verse 1. The heavens declare the glory of God, and the firmament showeth His handiwork. So they may never read a Bible, but they ought to be able to get that there's a God because those heavens declare it.

[77:10] Look at Psalms chapter 8. Now this ought to be what happens in every heart of man. This ought to be what happens. But as we've seen over the last two nights, you know, the atheist tries to say it isn't, that God didn't create it.

[77:26] Well, of course He did. And they have no reason to say that He didn't. They have no scientific evidence at all. But they'll say that He didn't. But look at Psalms chapter 8. Verse 1.

[77:37] O Lord, our Lord, how excellent is Thy name in all the earth, who hast set Thy glory above the heavens. Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hast Thou ordained strength because of Thine enemies, that Thou mightest still the enemy and the avenger.

[77:48] When I consider Thy heavens, the work of Thy fingers, the moon and the stars which Thou hast ordained, what is man that Thou art mindful of him? And the son of man that Thou visitest him.

[78:00] That should be the reaction of every person out there that looks up at the moon and the stars at night and the sun as it travels throughout its course. Because those things declare the glory of God. So it's a natural thing to look up and say, man, Lord, why would you have anything to do with us?

[78:15] Look at what you can do. So they make those arguments about, you know, well, what about the heathen that have never heard? Oh, they know. They know a lot better than college-educated Americans know.

[78:28] That's for sure. You can't talk one of those folks out that have grown up in country living and that kind of stuff and really haven't seen the doors of a college and all that kind of... You can't talk them out of their belief in God.

[78:41] I'm not talking about necessarily belief in Jesus Christ for salvation. I'm talking about they know God's there. Dr. Ruckman said it and I went to PBI so I say it because I was there but you got to go to college to be that stupid.

[78:56] And that's what they do. So those four arguments, they kind of work their way out of atheists in different ways but if you can get those four down at least then you'll have some footing to deal with them where they're at.

[79:08] And always give them scripture. Same thing with any... If you're witnessing to a Catholic, give them scripture. You know, it's no different than an atheist. The moment you start trying to go back and forth with scientific, you know, hoopla or whatever it is, you're just dealing in the realms of man's knowledge.

[79:27] You got to get past that. The only way to get past that is with the scriptures. So take that sword and use it. And so with that, I'll run over time again and I apologize, I didn't mean to but it's eight o'clock now but we'll open it up for a few questions if you got them.

[79:41] And if you do, we'll take you to the scripture to show you the answer to them. So any questions up to there? Brother?

[79:57] Only after the single cell, only after the self-replicating molecule came about but we don't know how that came about though. Yeah, praise the Lord, brother. Anybody else?

[80:07] Any other questions on that kind of stuff? Joe's got his hand up. Hey, buddy, you got a question?

[80:21] All right. Well, that's it, folks. And like I said, that atheist stuff, the reason why you want to remember that is because the Lord reminds Laodicea of it. You've got two generations that believe it now coming up.

[80:32] You're going to have to deal with it if you care about soul winning. Now, if you don't care about soul winning, you won't deal with it and it's going to be boring and mean nothing to you. But if you can get into a battle for souls and use the scriptures to show them the truth of the matter and win their souls, you'll see the value in it.

[80:46] So I encourage you to take it to the streets, take it to the gas station, take it to the grocery store, carry a New Testament with you, carry something small you can grab out of the car quick and say, hold on, let me get my Bible and show you.

[81:00] And then take those four arguments and all that stuff with you. And Lord willing, you'll see some souls saved with it. Now, on that Navy base, I had the time of my life and I really do, I really do, I really am excited to get to Georgia and do it again because traveling on the road, it's harder to get into an area and witness in that area and stuff like that, especially if you're going to church on Saturday and Sundays and Mondays and all that stuff, you're traveling and all that kind of stuff.

[81:29] But on that Navy base, man, we had the time of our life. We'd have a 45-minute Bible study and we'd open it up for questions and we would tell them, any question you got in five seconds or less will be to the first scripture and we'd do it, man.

[81:43] And I'm sitting there and I'm talking with these two young ladies. They had come over from a female barracks there and it was in the male barracks we were having the Bible study and they'd come two weeks in a row and we'd open up for questions and there's this young lady over here named Taylor and she's, you can tell, she's on the edge of her seat wanting to ask a question.

[81:59] But the mate that she's with realizes what time it is so they have to leave and I catch her before she leaves and I say, hey, I can tell you you got a question. Just ask me what the question is and we'll answer it next time because at that point we were going Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday so it's going to be back the next night and we're going to try to answer it then.

[82:15] So as she's walking out, she says, why does God allow suicide? Why does God allow suicide? Which is another form of the question, why does God allow bad things to happen to good people?

[82:28] It's kind of the same thing, just rephrased. And I said, I don't have the time to answer it right now but I already know the answer for you and I gave her a couple things and said, come back and we'll show it to you. So we did. A week later, she came back and the whole lesson was on suicide and man's will, the devil's will, and God's will and you see a couple of suicides in scripture and all that kind of stuff.

[82:47] Showed her all that stuff, about 45 minutes. And Joe, the guy I was with, we were both called Joe, and Joe, the guy I was with, kind of was paying attention and she was on the edge of her seat, she was listening, she was getting the facts and stuff like that and so he starts to deal with the other folks there, there's about five or six of them.

[83:05] And so I go over and I sit down and I'm talking to her now, well what do you think about that? What do you think about what the Bible says about that kind of stuff? And she says, yeah, I get it. She's like, I guess I just don't, I just don't deserve forgiveness.

[83:25] I said, what are you talking about? Come to find out her friend had committed suicide and she blamed herself. So the only way to get around that was to figure out why God would allow it. But after dealing with it and her admitting that, I turned over to Romans chapter five and I said, God commendeth his love towards Taylor.

[83:43] And that while Taylor was yet a sinner, Christ died for Taylor. And I read Taylor's name down through the Romans chapter five passage. Five minutes later, she was asking the Lord Jesus Christ to save her soul.

[83:58] I'm dealing with another kid and then Gabriel LaQuesta. This guy was, this guy was a showboat, man. And he came in there and he was talking about how much he believed in God and all this kind of stuff. He was, we're going through these atheistic stuff and I was going through some of the arguments he was bringing up and we went over some scientific stuff back in Genesis chapter two and three and I was showing that stuff to him and then I got to the crucifixion.

[84:20] We were talking about Jesus Christ dying and why he died and all that and he stops. Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on a second. You mean to tell me that all I have to do is ask Jesus Christ to save me from hell, believing on him and he'll do it?

[84:31] I said, yeah, you want to do it right now? And he said, yeah. He gets out of the chair, there's seven of us in that room and he kneels down on that carpet and I kneel down with him and he calls out and asks Jesus Christ to save him.

[84:42] And then I'm dealing with another fellow. His name is Zachary. Zachary is a black fellow. He's about 20 years old at that time. He's in the Navy and we're sitting back after the study time and we're sitting in the last pew and he's starting to tell me that he was a Catholic growing up and his parents were messing with him and the Catholic priest was messing with him so he gave up God and turned against him and all that kind of stuff.

[85:01] All that stuff's coming out, see? But we're dealing, I'm showing him in Scripture where that's man's will and that's the devil working that kind of stuff out. It's not necessarily God's fault but Jesus Christ died to save your soul and all that kind of stuff and he, after an hour and 20 minutes of running through this stuff with him and showing him Jesus Christ's death, bone, resurrection, he gets out of that pew and kneels down and asks Jesus Christ to save him.

[85:21] It might take you an hour or two, Christian, but there's stories like that for you out here in Sylmar if you'll take the time to go win them. If you'll take the time to work and fight for their soul with the truth out of the Scriptures and you take it to them, you'll be able to have your own stories.

[85:42] Those are mine, don't you go stealing them. With that, let's pray. Father, we come before you tonight. Thank you for your book and thank you for the truth. Thank you that you provided this truth for man and we can go and get it anytime we please and Lord, you stopped me as I was headed for hell.

[85:57] You sent a preacher by my way. Father, as a young kid going to church, I heard the gospel plenty of times and your Holy Spirit dealt with me about going to hell and you saved my soul from hell. Lord David got it right when he said, seek thy servant, Father, without you and you seeking us and trying to give us chance after chance after chance, there'd be no way, no way I'd be standing here right now.

[86:18] It's only by your grace and mercy, by your son Jesus Christ taking my sin on him, carrying it to the cross, dying and rising again the third day proving who he was, who he is.

[86:30] Thank you so much. Thank you for this King James Bible. Thank you that it literally has every answer to man's problems, every answer to any question man could ever come up with. The answers are found written in the pages of the King James Bible.

[86:44] I pray you'd help us now to take you to the lost world. Help us to take the truth to him, Father, and give him the answers. Lord, I feel bad for men like Stephen Hawking and Richard Dawkins who grew up Catholic and didn't have the truth.

[86:56] Now, maybe if they would have sat down with somebody who knew the Bible they wouldn't be the way they are. But they've affected a couple generations now and they're starting to affect Christians.

[87:08] And so I pray you'd help us now to remember our creator in the days of our youth. Remember the truth of the scripture and carry it with us and fight for it and fight the good fight of faith until the very end.

[87:21] Until either you come back and get us out of this mess or we meet you by death. Please, oh God, help us. There's plenty of things that we're going to need your help with.

[87:31] Father, we haven't got it all figured out and we know that. But please give us the help as we go out here to Silmar, to Judea, to Jerusalem, and around all the outermost parts of the earth and try to get the gospel out to these folks.

[87:41] Help now. Please bless. And I pray this was pleasing to you in Jesus Christ's name. Amen. Pastor?