Complacency vs. Conviction: A Warning from Zephaniah
Pastor Josh Massaro delivers a powerful message emphasizing the importance of humility and repentance in the face of God's impending judgment as presented in the book of Zephaniah. He cautions against complacency, urging listeners to recognize the dangers of allowing worldly influences to infiltrate their faith and practices. By highlighting the consequences for both leaders and ordinary believers who compromise their values, Pastor Josh stresses that even those who seem righteous must remain vigilant. He reminds the congregation that true repentance leads to grace, and that a personal relationship with God is essential for spiritual vitality. As the service unfolds, listeners are encouraged to seek a deeper understanding of their faith and to embrace the call to humility and submission to God's will.
Pastor Josh Massaro's sermon at Middletown Baptist Church serves as a profound examination of Zephaniah’s prophetic message, highlighting the duality of God’s character — His love and His justice. With an engaging tone, Pastor Josh welcomes the congregation and expresses his hope that the message will provide spiritual nourishment. He sets the stage for a deep dive into the book of Zephaniah, emphasizing the importance of understanding God’s holiness and the reality of His judgment against sin. The pastor delineates that while God is indeed loving and gracious, He remains a righteous judge who will not ignore rebellion against His laws. This foundational understanding is critical for believers as they navigate their faith in a world rife with distractions and competing ideologies.
Throughout the sermon, Pastor Josh draws attention to the historical context of Zephaniah's warnings to Judah, where spiritual complacency had taken root. He articulates how the people had allowed worldly influences to seep into their worship, paralleling the ancient struggles with modern-day temptations. The pastor candidly shares his own experiences with material desires, making the message relatable and poignant. He challenges the congregation to evaluate their lives for any signs of compromise, urging them to recognize that the pursuit of worldly success can lead to a loss of spiritual vitality. He warns against the dangers of blending faith with secular values, a theme that resonates deeply in a culture increasingly characterized by relativism and moral ambiguity.
As the sermon progresses, the emphasis on repentance becomes pronounced, with Pastor Josh passionately calling his congregation to action. He uses vivid imagery to describe God’s pursuit of His people, likening it to searching with candles in the dark — a metaphor for God's relentless desire to bring His people back to Him. He asserts that true revival begins with the acknowledgment of one's sins and a sincere turn towards God. The pastor concludes with a hopeful message, reminding listeners that despite the gravity of judgment, grace is always within reach for those who humble themselves before God. This sermon ultimately serves as both a warning and an invitation, urging the church community to embrace a life of holiness and submission to the divine will, reinforcing the idea that in repentance lies the path to restoration and a deeper relationship with God.
Takeaways:
- Pastor Josh emphasizes the importance of repentance and humility to receive God's grace.
- The message warns against complacency in faith and the dangers of apathy.
- God's judgment is inevitable for those who refuse to acknowledge their sinfulness.
- Materialism can lead to spiritual blindness, distracting believers from their relationship with God.
- True revival begins with a heartfelt return to God through repentance and humility.
- The episode highlights that even good leaders must remain vigilant against worldliness.
Links referenced in this episode:
Thank you for joining our podcast. Visit our website at https://middletownbaptistchurch.org/
Subscribe to our YouTube at https://www.youtube.com/@middletownbaptistchurchde5091
Follow us on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/MBCDelaware
This podcast is produced by Ralph Estep, Jr., host of the Ask Ralph Podcast, a daily podcast on Christian Finance you can find it at https://www.askralphpodcast.com/
00:00 - None
00:00 - Introduction to the Podcast
00:06 - The Blessings of Preaching
01:05 - Exploring the Book of Zephaniah
01:54 - God's Justice and Judgment
02:49 - The Importance of Repentance
04:11 - Judgment on Judah's Leaders
20:24 - The Complacency of God's People
31:59 - The Reality of God's Judgment
45:03 - Conclusion and Call to Action
45:10 - Outro and Invitation to Connect
Pastor Josh
Hello and welcome to the Middletown Baptist Church podcast, where we are proclaiming the truth to the world.
Pastor Josh
My name is Pastor Josh and I want to thank you for listening to this podcast.
Pastor Josh
I hope that this podcast can be a blessing to you and strengthen you in the word of God.
Pastor Josh
Now, come along, let's look into the Bible and see what God has for us here today, day by day.
Pastor Josh
I hope you've had a.
Pastor Josh
A good day so far, and I can tell you I've had a good day.
Pastor Josh
One of the reasons why I'm having a good day is because this is actually the third time that I've been able to preach today.
Pastor Josh
So third sermon I'm excited to do three.
Pastor Josh
If I could preach three times every day, that would be a dream.
Pastor Josh
But don't get a chance to preach three times every day unless you guys want to come up to the church.
Pastor Josh
And I would just love to do that sometimes.
Pastor Josh
That's why.
Pastor Josh
That's one of the reasons why I got the podcast going.
Pastor Josh
It just lets me talk to the.
Pastor Josh
To the microphone there.
Pastor Josh
So hopefully tonight I don't get confused with the two other sermons that I preached earlier on today, but I had a chance to preach at a Christian school and then also do a memorial service up at the Veteran Memorial Cemetery.
Pastor Josh
And so if you have your Bibles, let's turn to the book of.
Pastor Josh
Does anyone remember where we started last week?
Pastor Josh
Zephaniah.
Pastor Josh
I've got some good students here.
Pastor Josh
If you didn't remember that, that's okay.
Pastor Josh
You will get that for the next however long we're here.
Pastor Josh
Going to be getting the book of Zephaniah.
Pastor Josh
Now, Zephaniah is a book of the Bible in the Old Testament.
Pastor Josh
And so if you don't know where it is, you can flip around there in the minor prophets.
Pastor Josh
Eventually you'll find it.
Pastor Josh
And I like that name, Zephaniah.
Pastor Josh
You don't hear a lot of people name Zephaniah these days.
Pastor Josh
Maybe if we have another child in the future, that name's coming around.
Pastor Josh
No, Alicia says no.
Pastor Josh
No Zephaniah.
Pastor Josh
But anyway, Zephaniah means God.
Pastor Josh
God hides, God protects.
Pastor Josh
And we're going to see here in this case that God does protect his own, that God honors those who humbly submit to him in faith.
Pastor Josh
But we also know that God as a just God, is a God who must enact justice and judgment upon those that rebel against him.
Pastor Josh
And so God is amazingly holy in every aspect.
Pastor Josh
And so when he does enact justice, when he does demonstrate punishment upon those that are Guilty.
Pastor Josh
It's done in a way that's perfect.
Pastor Josh
And so one of the things that sometimes we struggle with is God demonstrating judgment upon different people.
Pastor Josh
In the Old Testament and the New, and even today, there are some people out there that teach that, you know, if God is loving, he will not judge those that are in sin.
Pastor Josh
And that's contrary to his character because God must be that righteous judge.
Pastor Josh
In his holiness, he must deal with sin.
Pastor Josh
But we also do know that God in His holiness, offers a way for forgiveness, and that is through repentance, that is through humility, that is through that opportunity to trust in him and him alone.
Pastor Josh
And we see that theme throughout the New Testament.
Pastor Josh
We see it in First Peter.
Pastor Josh
God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.
Pastor Josh
And that's essentially what Zephaniah is doing here.
Pastor Josh
He's.
Pastor Josh
He's giving a prophecy.
Pastor Josh
And not all prophecies are necessarily things about the future.
Pastor Josh
They are in many cases that way in the Old Testament.
Pastor Josh
But really all prophecy is.
Pastor Josh
Is speaking forth truth.
Pastor Josh
And so what Zephaniah is doing is he's speaking the word of God to the people there in Judah.
Pastor Josh
And he says, look, if you continue on in this path, God will judge.
Pastor Josh
This is a certainty.
Pastor Josh
And so that's a warning.
Pastor Josh
Zephaniah is preaching now.
Pastor Josh
He is preaching the literal word of God.
Pastor Josh
That's how God spoke to his people, through the prophet.
Pastor Josh
And so Zephaniah is preaching repentance, he's preaching judgment, he's preaching God's grace, but he's also preaching God's justice.
Pastor Josh
And we have to celebrate, as much as we celebrate God's love and his grace and his holiness, we also have to celebrate his justice and his righteousness.
Pastor Josh
And so what we see here in Zephaniah is last week we started this, and he talks about this complete and utter.
Pastor Josh
You know, in this case in verse two, he says, I will utterly consume all things from off the land, say at the Lord.
Pastor Josh
He's talking about a complete judgment.
Pastor Josh
He's talking about a judgment upon a nation if they reject.
Pastor Josh
And we're going to pick up here in verse number seven tonight.
Pastor Josh
Last week we talked about these individuals who were posing as priests.
Pastor Josh
They were posing as religious people, but they were hypocrites.
Pastor Josh
They were mingling the truths of God with the truths of the false God BAAL and the false God Moloch.
Pastor Josh
And they were taking in those practices and they were mingling that with the practices that God had told them to follow.
Pastor Josh
And therefore they were living hypocritical lives.
Pastor Josh
And God said, I'm going to judge that.
Pastor Josh
I'm going to judge those spiritual leaders that are misleading those people there in Jerusalem, there in Judah.
Pastor Josh
And so really, the first chapter is God going through all the different types of people that he will judge if they don't find repentance, if they don't come back to him in repentance.
Pastor Josh
And so we're going to pick up in verse number seven.
Pastor Josh
And he says this.
Pastor Josh
He says, hold thy peace at the presence of the Lord God.
Pastor Josh
Now, what is he saying here?
Pastor Josh
Well, essentially God is addressing the royalty in Judah.
Pastor Josh
Now he.
Pastor Josh
He shifts gears from the broad spectrum of all of Judah and from the religious leaders of Judah.
Pastor Josh
Now he's going to speak to the leadership.
Pastor Josh
He's going to speak to the royalty there in Judah.
Pastor Josh
And what does he say?
Pastor Josh
Well, verse number seven is a nice way to say, be quiet.
Pastor Josh
Instead of trying to respond to me, instead of trying to get ahead of me and give me excuses, you need to just listen because I'm going to tell you the whole story.
Pastor Josh
And so God addresses the royalty of Judah in a way that they aren't used to hearing.
Pastor Josh
He tells them to be quiet and listen to his pronouncement of judgment.
Pastor Josh
And he says, a sacrifice of judgment is going to be made against a wicked nation.
Pastor Josh
He says, hold thy peace at the presence of the Lord God, for the day of the Lord is at hand.
Pastor Josh
This is speaking specifically to the judgment that will be seen there at that time coming in the near future.
Pastor Josh
But also we know that, that ultimately the day of the Lord is evidently going to be coming at the end time completely, to judge all those that are in sin, to judge all of those that have rebelled against God for all of history.
Pastor Josh
So he says, for the day of the Lord is at hand, for the Lord hath prepared a sacrifice and he hath bid his guest.
Pastor Josh
And so what it says here is that God is ready to judge.
Pastor Josh
And this needs to be a reality for many people, because for a lot of people, they put off repentance.
Pastor Josh
It's kind of like this idea of, well, I'm going to just hope that it goes away, and eventually God's judgment will go away.
Pastor Josh
But what we see is this is an inevitable thing.
Pastor Josh
Verse 8.
Pastor Josh
And he says here, and it shall come to pass in the day of the Lord's sacrifice.
Pastor Josh
So he's talking about the day of judgment, that I will punish the princes and the king's children and all such as are clothed with strange apparel.
Pastor Josh
And what's he Talking about here?
Pastor Josh
Well, he says that this warning is not just for individuals that are under the king's rule, but this is for the king and the princes and all of the family.
Pastor Josh
And so this is a complete judgment upon that.
Pastor Josh
And even in the case of context, remember who is the king at this point?
Pastor Josh
Does anyone remember, we read about it early on.
Pastor Josh
He's a good king.
Pastor Josh
Josiah.
Pastor Josh
Josiah is the king.
Pastor Josh
And so this is a warning even for those that would be considered, hey, they're godly leaders.
Pastor Josh
This is a warning to stay on track.
Pastor Josh
This is a warning to say, you know what?
Pastor Josh
I need to be cognizant.
Pastor Josh
I need to be aware of the ability for me to drift off if I become complacent.
Pastor Josh
I've heard a lot of preachers get up and say, I would never do this or I would never do that.
Pastor Josh
I used to do that all the time with my children before I had children.
Pastor Josh
I remember when Alicia and I would go out to, like, eat at a restaurant, and we would see these kids that were, like, making noise.
Pastor Josh
I remember saying, man, I will never let my children act up in a public place.
Pastor Josh
I just don't know what these people are doing.
Pastor Josh
And then I realized when I started to have chillin.
Pastor Josh
It's not as easy, okay?
Pastor Josh
It takes some discipline, right?
Pastor Josh
And if we're not aware of that, the default setting will be that there will be chaos.
Pastor Josh
There will be.
Pastor Josh
There will be confusion.
Pastor Josh
And so the warning here is not just for an unruly king.
Pastor Josh
It's for a king who is a.
Pastor Josh
What we would consider a good king, following the word of God.
Pastor Josh
But there always can be the path of divergent.
Pastor Josh
It always could go off, and it could always be a time where we could fall into that trap of prayer.
Pastor Josh
And then he says here, and all such as are clothed with strange apparel.
Pastor Josh
Or you could say it this way, clothed with foreign apparel.
Pastor Josh
And so the priests and the leaders of Judah were ashamed of their national identity.
Pastor Josh
So much so that they love to look like the enemy.
Pastor Josh
They love to look like those pagan nations that were around them.
Pastor Josh
They wanted to be so much like the worldly nations around them that they would actually emulate those nations around them.
Pastor Josh
They would wear their apparel.
Pastor Josh
They would identify with those pagan nations.
Pastor Josh
And so what is he speaking to here?
Pastor Josh
He's speaking to worldliness.
Pastor Josh
We talked about that on Sunday morning about separating ourselves from the influence of this world, because who we associate with will eventually lead to who influences us, right?
Pastor Josh
So if I associate with the world, I'm going to eventually be influenced by the world.
Pastor Josh
I'm eventually going to compromise to the ways of the world and ultimately fall into a path of living like the world.
Pastor Josh
And so the judgment, the condemnation, is against the individuals who clothe themselves with foreign apparel to look like those people that are around them.
Pastor Josh
Because they were looking at it from this perspective.
Pastor Josh
Look at these foreign nations.
Pastor Josh
Look at their success.
Pastor Josh
Look at the pleasure that they're having.
Pastor Josh
Look at the freedom that they have, right?
Pastor Josh
The seeming freedom of living a life of that pagan worship.
Pastor Josh
And it seemed to many of the people that were living in Judah at the time that these foreigners were actually having more success than they were.
Pastor Josh
And so what they would say is, hey, we'll still practice worship the way that God tells us to worship, but we want to look like the world.
Pastor Josh
And I'm going to tell you in practice today what that looks like is, hey, you know what?
Pastor Josh
We're the church, but we want to look as much as we can like the world.
Pastor Josh
Instead of saying we want the world to be influenced by the church, we take the world and allow the world to influence what we do within the church.
Pastor Josh
And that doesn't always look like what we expect it to look like.
Pastor Josh
Sometimes we say, well, you know what?
Pastor Josh
We look the part.
Pastor Josh
We look good, we look like a church.
Pastor Josh
And I would say, that's one step of it.
Pastor Josh
But I'd also say how we act, how we think, how we respond, how we deal with people.
Pastor Josh
You know, there's ways that the world teaches today.
Pastor Josh
That is not what the Bible says is a unified church, right?
Pastor Josh
Get what you can, cut other people down, talk behind their back.
Pastor Josh
The Bible says, no, that's not the way to go.
Pastor Josh
And so these individuals were adopting the strange apparel of the world, and they were expecting to receive the blessings of God.
Pastor Josh
And so all of those people there were allowing themselves to be infiltrated by the ways of the world.
Pastor Josh
And God judges that God is opposed to that.
Pastor Josh
Verse nine, it says, in the same day also will I punish all those that leap on the threshold.
Pastor Josh
Now, that's a phrase I had to look up, right?
Pastor Josh
Because I'm like, is God really mad when they leap on the threshold?
Pastor Josh
What is he talking about here?
Pastor Josh
What we can see is that this was an idiom.
Pastor Josh
This was a phrase that would have been used at that timeframe about changing their perspective on things, jumping ship, if you will, go into another place.
Pastor Josh
And so there's a lot of commentators that would talk about this.
Pastor Josh
This would be basically bringing pagan customs and superstitions into the house of God.
Pastor Josh
We saw that obviously throughout the Old Testament, they would take elements of pagan worship and they would try to cross over that threshold and bring that into the house of God.
Pastor Josh
And that's what we were talking about before.
Pastor Josh
Taking things that are worldly focused, idolatrous, pagan, fleshly, and trying to infiltrate that with the stamp of the church.
Pastor Josh
And so I would warn us against that because what it says here is that it says that, that ultimately it says which fill their masters houses with violence and deceit.
Pastor Josh
And so the outcome of bringing that into our midst is what it says there, violence and deceit.
Pastor Josh
And the Bible has a lot to say about that.
Pastor Josh
But what we can see here is that ultimately when we compromise our values, when we compromise our truth, and when we try to mingle the ways of the world and God is never going to be pleased because why it leads to sin, it leads to violence, it leads to division, it leads to deceit, it leads to these lies that ultimately produce themselves in actions that are not God honoring.
Pastor Josh
I talked to the Christian school group today and I was talking to them about, hey, you hear all the rules and how you should act and how you should live and how you should be different.
Pastor Josh
But a lot of times we see that from a perspective of performance.
Pastor Josh
Really, how can I try to follow all the rules?
Pastor Josh
How can I look the part?
Pastor Josh
And what the Bible says is really, this is a heart issue.
Pastor Josh
It's never really an issue of how much you have in your willpower.
Pastor Josh
Because there are some people that might have a stronger willpower than others.
Pastor Josh
But eventually what the Bible tells us is that we're all gonna fail if it's fleshly focused, whether it's good intentions or not.
Pastor Josh
Like, I could sit here today and I could wake up and I could say, I'm gonna try my best not to and then fill in the blank with that sin.
Pastor Josh
And I might go a period of time in my day where I feel like I've accomplished that.
Pastor Josh
But the very moment that I trust in my own flesh to accomplish these things is the moment that I'm focusing on self.
Pastor Josh
That's self worship.
Pastor Josh
A lot of times we think of idolatry as a figure outside of ourselves.
Pastor Josh
Like, so we think of a little statue of BAAL or a big statue of Moloch, or maybe even today we understand, you know, like the phone can become an idol.
Pastor Josh
But do you know that the Bible says that we can actually put the focus on ourselves and lift ourselves up to a point where we have become our own idol?
Pastor Josh
We're humanistic in our focus in our society.
Pastor Josh
Today, there is a strong push, and there always has been.
Pastor Josh
And it's packaged different ways, but there's always been a push for humanism.
Pastor Josh
It's always about inflating yourself, lifting yourself up.
Pastor Josh
From the very beginning in the garden, right, the original lie was, hey, you can be like God.
Pastor Josh
And that has progressed and progressed into.
Pastor Josh
Look at our society today.
Pastor Josh
That's this.
Pastor Josh
That's what we're seeing over and over and over again.
Pastor Josh
And Satan does that through as we see there, Verse nine, deceit.
Pastor Josh
And so what happens here is that God is telling them that he will judge those that specifically are leaders, but all folks that allow the worldly ways to infiltrate into their lives and then affect their lives.
Pastor Josh
Now, of course, there's repentance, and of course there's grace.
Pastor Josh
And of course there's ultimately God's forgiveness to those that come back to him in humility.
Pastor Josh
But what he's saying is, you need to wake up to this.
Pastor Josh
Because what's happening here, and we're gonna see it here in a few verses, there was a sense of complacency with these people in Judah.
Pastor Josh
They were the ones that thought they were better than the Northern Kingdom.
Pastor Josh
And the Northern Kingdom had fallen.
Pastor Josh
They were the ones that were pagan.
Pastor Josh
We're okay.
Pastor Josh
Everything's gonna be all right.
Pastor Josh
And so there is this sense of complacency.
Pastor Josh
And with that sense of complacency comes apathy, right?
Pastor Josh
I become complacent, and then I become apathetic, Meaning I don't care about what's going on.
Pastor Josh
We're okay, God.
Pastor Josh
We don't need anything.
Pastor Josh
We're good.
Pastor Josh
Don't try to change what we're trying to do.
Pastor Josh
Isn't that what we are in our society today, in our churches today?
Pastor Josh
Like, hey, what if God pulls me to do something else?
Pastor Josh
No, I don't want to do that, because that's not what I'm comfortable with.
Pastor Josh
I'm complacent, I'm apathetic.
Pastor Josh
And so what we see here in this case is that God says, you need to wake up to the reality of what you're actually doing.
Pastor Josh
And so judgment is upon those leaders.
Pastor Josh
But then we see verse 10.
Pastor Josh
He shifts gears.
Pastor Josh
And now the judgment is going to be promised to the merchants.
Pastor Josh
And the merchants are those at this time period that would deal with the money.
Pastor Josh
And obviously they were selling goods.
Pastor Josh
And we're going to talk about two different industries.
Pastor Josh
But really what he's addressing here is those that are putting their trust and their faith in finances.
Pastor Josh
They're putting all Their hope in their money.
Pastor Josh
So we're seeing God go right down the line and show all the things that he hates.
Pastor Josh
He hates those religious hypocrites.
Pastor Josh
He hates those compromise compromisers, the ones that bring the worldliness into worship.
Pastor Josh
And now he's going to talk about those who love money.
Pastor Josh
We know what the New Testament says about that, that the love of money, not money itself, but the love of money, is the root of evil.
Pastor Josh
It's the root of all different types of sin.
Pastor Josh
Because of our prideful hearts.
Pastor Josh
And I mentioned this morning to the Christian school and I've said this within our own church.
Pastor Josh
A good thing can become a bad thing if it becomes the first thing.
Pastor Josh
I can tell you there's a lot of things in our life that in and of themselves are not sinful.
Pastor Josh
Right?
Pastor Josh
Money in and of itself is not sinful.
Pastor Josh
A hobby in and of itself is not sinful.
Pastor Josh
Loving another human being is not sinful unless that comes first before our love for God.
Pastor Josh
And so what he's going to say here is this verse 10.
Pastor Josh
And it shall come to pass in that day, saith the Lord, that there shall be the noise of a cry from the fish gate and then howling from the second and a great crashing from the hills.
Pastor Josh
Now, if you were to read that in and of itself, you would say, what is he talking about there?
Pastor Josh
The fish, the fish gate.
Pastor Josh
Well, the fish gate was a specific gate there in Jerusalem.
Pastor Josh
That would have been the gate that the fishermen would use for their commerce.
Pastor Josh
They would bring in the fish from the different areas and they would come and they would trade.
Pastor Josh
So it was the gate to the fish market.
Pastor Josh
So it was a place where they would get money.
Pastor Josh
It was a place where they would bring in those finances that they were loving so much.
Pastor Josh
And then we see in verse number 11, he says how ye inhabitants of Maktesh, for all the merchant people are cut down.
Pastor Josh
All they that bear silver are cut off.
Pastor Josh
Now, I had to look up what Maktesh was, but Maktesh was a place where the silver merchants would be.
Pastor Josh
And they were obviously known for loving money and pushing things upon people and allowing themselves to be overtaken by the love of that money.
Pastor Josh
And so what does the Lord say here?
Pastor Josh
Well, he says that the merchants and those with money, that they.
Pastor Josh
That they would put their faith and trust in their riches.
Pastor Josh
Now God promises to cut those people down in their idolatry, the idolatry of money.
Pastor Josh
And the Bible tells us that this isn't just a, an Old Testament concept.
Pastor Josh
This is a New Testament concept.
Pastor Josh
Colossians chapter 3, verses 5 and 6.
Pastor Josh
Mortify, therefore your members.
Pastor Josh
You know what that word mortify means?
Pastor Josh
It means kill it.
Pastor Josh
Mortify, therefore your members which are upon the earth.
Pastor Josh
And he talks about these different sins.
Pastor Josh
He says, fornication.
Pastor Josh
And we know that fornication is anything, anything sexual outside the bond of marriage.
Pastor Josh
Fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry.
Pastor Josh
So the Bible actually says that when we love money and we covet money, that is idolatry.
Pastor Josh
And what basically happens is that money becomes our idol.
Pastor Josh
And you don't have to have a lot of money to love money.
Pastor Josh
I think that was sometimes a concept that I didn't grasp when I was.
Pastor Josh
When I was a young man out of college, I was working at a Christian school.
Pastor Josh
And if you know anything about Christian schools, any teacher that's working at a Christian school is not gonna become a millionaire off of the salary of that Christian school.
Pastor Josh
Okay, if there is a Christian school that's like that, let me know, okay?
Pastor Josh
I'm gonna spread the word around.
Pastor Josh
But the reality is we were getting paid very little.
Pastor Josh
And I would hear a preacher get up and say, you know what?
Pastor Josh
The love of money is the root of all sin.
Pastor Josh
And I'm like, well, trust me, I can't love the money that I don't have, okay?
Pastor Josh
And I had to have someone sit down next to me.
Pastor Josh
And they say, it's not about how much you have, it's about how hard you're trying to hold on to that.
Pastor Josh
Right?
Pastor Josh
And so I didn't have much money.
Pastor Josh
So I love that money so much that I'm like, I can't do anything with it.
Pastor Josh
And that's all I can focus on.
Pastor Josh
The truth is, it doesn't matter how much is in our bank account.
Pastor Josh
What matters is our heart.
Pastor Josh
It always goes back to that.
Pastor Josh
And so what we can see here in this case is that God hates that.
Pastor Josh
He lists all these sins and he says, and covetousness, which is idolatry, for which things sake of the wrath of God, cometh on the children of disobedience.
Pastor Josh
And so the Bible speaks very strongly in the Old Testament and the new of those folks who desire money more than anything else.
Pastor Josh
These folks were desiring money more than God.
Pastor Josh
They were desiring the silver more than God.
Pastor Josh
And therefore God says, I'm going to judge you unless you repent.
Pastor Josh
And so the judgment was placed upon the originally those spiritual leaders that were misleading them with false teaching.
Pastor Josh
There was judgment upon the leaders who had compromised to the worldly ways.
Pastor Josh
There was judgment upon those that love money, the merchants.
Pastor Josh
And now we're going to see in verse number 12, judgment promised to the complacent.
Pastor Josh
And these are the people that we would say that they're not out there doing these horrible pagan things.
Pastor Josh
They're people that are just complacent.
Pastor Josh
It says, and it shall come to pass at that time that I will search Jerusalem with candles, man.
Pastor Josh
This shows that God is serious about this.
Pastor Josh
Even when it gets dark, he's going to search with candles and punish the men that are settled on their lees.
Pastor Josh
Now, this is interesting here.
Pastor Josh
What he basically says is this.
Pastor Josh
That word lees is a archaic term for complacency.
Pastor Josh
And so he says, I'm going to punish those who are settled in their complacency.
Pastor Josh
The Lord promised judgment against those who felt that God was distant or detached from their lives.
Pastor Josh
And so because of that perceived distance from God, they just became complacent.
Pastor Josh
They didn't care anymore about their relationship with God.
Pastor Josh
And so the Lord says, I'm going to judge those people who have gone to this place of complacency.
Pastor Josh
And what now, what was their.
Pastor Josh
How could we say that they were complacent?
Pastor Josh
Well, it says there, verse number 12, that say in their hearts, the Lord will not do good, neither will he do evil.
Pastor Josh
And some people believe in this case that, you know, God isn't interested in my matters.
Pastor Josh
He's not interested in my life.
Pastor Josh
This is the classic theological teaching of Deism, that God is this great clockmaker, that he sets everything in motion and he just backs up.
Pastor Josh
He doesn't want a personal relationship with me.
Pastor Josh
He doesn't care about my life.
Pastor Josh
He has bigger things to deal with.
Pastor Josh
And that's really what they're saying here.
Pastor Josh
Some people believe that God is just this great clockmaker who creates the universe, winds it up, and then just lets it go.
Pastor Josh
Those who believe this way don't understand the closeness that God desires for us in our relationship.
Pastor Josh
Those who believe that there is no God or that he doesn't want anything to do with man totally miss out on what the Bible actually says about the character of God.
Pastor Josh
God wants a personal relationship with us.
Pastor Josh
He wanted a personal relationship with Israel.
Pastor Josh
He wants a personal relationship with you.
Pastor Josh
And so these people are saying, you know what?
Pastor Josh
The Lord will not do good, neither will he do evil.
Pastor Josh
He just is just up there.
Pastor Josh
He's just this being up in the sky.
Pastor Josh
And isn't that.
Pastor Josh
I mean, even more so maybe A few years ago.
Pastor Josh
Nowadays we're seeing on the rise atheism, just basically, there is no God.
Pastor Josh
Or.
Pastor Josh
Or agnosticism, which is like, well, there might be a God, but how could I ever know?
Pastor Josh
But even so, even with people that would claim to be religious in our society today, they're not really understanding that it is a personal walk with God.
Pastor Josh
It's more just, hey, there's a big man upstairs.
Pastor Josh
He cares about certain things.
Pastor Josh
But you know what?
Pastor Josh
How could I really even know?
Pastor Josh
I don't know.
Pastor Josh
If you've ever shared the gospel with somebody.
Pastor Josh
If you have shared the gospel with somebody, at some point, you've probably heard the answer to this question.
Pastor Josh
Okay, if I was to ask you, hey, are you going to heaven?
Pastor Josh
I think that's a kind of an interesting question to ask someone because you can always kind of tell where they stand when they answer.
Pastor Josh
And a lot of times people will say yes.
Pastor Josh
And then you say, well, why do you think that?
Pastor Josh
And then you'll see sometimes the human nature come out, well, I think that I'm a good person.
Pastor Josh
I think my good outweighs my bad.
Pastor Josh
So that individual is trusting in their own works, right?
Pastor Josh
That individual is trusting in this idea that, hey, I might be a good person.
Pastor Josh
There's other people that would say, oh, no, I.
Pastor Josh
I'm not going to heaven.
Pastor Josh
I'm a bad person.
Pastor Josh
And they have no concept of that.
Pastor Josh
There could be forgiveness for that.
Pastor Josh
I've already done enough wrongs.
Pastor Josh
But then you'll also find people that will say this, well, I hope that I will go to heaven, but how can we ever really know?
Pastor Josh
And these are all fallacies.
Pastor Josh
These are all terrible interpretations of scripture.
Pastor Josh
The Bible says in First John, chapter five, these things are written unto you that believe in the name of the.
Pastor Josh
Of the Lord, that you can know that you have everlasting life.
Pastor Josh
There is an assurance when it comes to our faith.
Pastor Josh
And so these people here that are listed in verses 12 and 13, they were.
Pastor Josh
They were complacent.
Pastor Josh
I was reading excerpts of the book the decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, and some of you are like, wow, that's a heavy read.
Pastor Josh
Okay, I was reading excerpts of it.
Pastor Josh
I wasn't reading the whole thing, but recently I was reading through it and I saw this basically highlighted.
Pastor Josh
There were attitudes that were characterized in the end of the Roman Empire that I would say are a lot similar to what we have today in our society.
Pastor Josh
It said this.
Pastor Josh
The people regarded all religions as equally true.
Pastor Josh
We see a lot of people saying that today.
Pastor Josh
Right.
Pastor Josh
Well, all you gotta do is be, you know, serious about something and that's enough.
Pastor Josh
The philosophers regarded all religions as false.
Pastor Josh
Like basically, it's all about man.
Pastor Josh
If you're a religious person, it's just a distraction.
Pastor Josh
And then it said the politicians regarded all religions as equally useful.
Pastor Josh
Meaning there were people that use religion for their own purposes, right?
Pastor Josh
And we saw that in the fall of the Roman Empire and we're seeing that happening today.
Pastor Josh
And so there is this judgment that comes upon these different people and they don't care.
Pastor Josh
They don't care.
Pastor Josh
Verse 13.
Pastor Josh
Therefore their good shall become a booty and their houses a desolation.
Pastor Josh
They shall also build houses, but not inhabit them.
Pastor Josh
And they shall plant vineyards, but not drink the wine thereof.
Pastor Josh
And so the Bible tells us very clearly here that these people are so complacent that they don't even care.
Pastor Josh
They're building things, they're planning for things, and they don't even care about the judgment that is to come.
Pastor Josh
Their minds are so focused on what they have in front of them, they don't care about what God says.
Pastor Josh
And I can tell you that that is very similar to our society today.
Pastor Josh
There are people out there preaching the truth.
Pastor Josh
There are people out there warning people, but that is not enough for many people because they just don't care.
Pastor Josh
I don't want to hear it.
Pastor Josh
Don't tell me this.
Pastor Josh
And I'm going to tell you here today, don't be opposed to hearing about God's judgment because that allows us to understand that God is a righteous judge.
Pastor Josh
And I would even say that as a Christian, if you are a born again believer, don't shy away from the preaching of the word of God that steps on your toes, that gives you conviction.
Pastor Josh
I know that sometimes I would be.
Pastor Josh
I heard a lot of preaching in my life because I went to a Christian school.
Pastor Josh
We would have chapel on Tuesdays and Thursdays.
Pastor Josh
I would go to church on Wednesday night.
Pastor Josh
I would go to church on Sunday morning, Sunday night.
Pastor Josh
I would get sermons basically throughout the week, all week.
Pastor Josh
And that was a good thing.
Pastor Josh
But also I do remember when preachers would get up and hit the topics that I was convicted on.
Pastor Josh
You know what I would do?
Pastor Josh
I would just.
Pastor Josh
I wouldn't really physically do it because that would be kind of weird.
Pastor Josh
But I wanted to just put my fingers in my ears and just go, I don't want to hear this.
Pastor Josh
I don't want to hear this.
Pastor Josh
I don't want to be responsible for this.
Pastor Josh
And sometimes we don't do that physically, but sometimes Spiritually, we just say, you know what?
Pastor Josh
I just don't want to think about that.
Pastor Josh
But the truth is that when that conviction comes, that's a good thing, because that's God trying to call out to you.
Pastor Josh
That's God pricking your heart.
Pastor Josh
And you have to make that decision on whether or not you're going to be sensitive to the Holy Spirit.
Pastor Josh
Are you going to be sensitive to the Holy Spirit's call in your life for conviction?
Pastor Josh
All of us want the comfort.
Pastor Josh
The Bible says that the Holy Spirit is a comforter, and we, hopefully, you strive for the comfort of the Spirit.
Pastor Josh
That's an exciting thing, to be comforted by the Spirit.
Pastor Josh
If you've never experienced that, folks, that's something that is undeniably a miracle, that you can feel the comfort of the Spirit in the midst of a difficulty, and we welcome that.
Pastor Josh
But a lot of times, we don't welcome the conviction of the Spirit.
Pastor Josh
And the conviction of the Spirit is what leads us to a place of comfort, because we need to get that right.
Pastor Josh
God chastises.
Pastor Josh
He disciplines his own.
Pastor Josh
And if there's an individual, and I'm gonna go out on a limb here, and I'm gonna say, if there's a Christian that says, you know what?
Pastor Josh
I haven't felt the Holy Spirit's conviction in a very, very long time, there is an issue there.
Pastor Josh
There is a problem there.
Pastor Josh
A little while back, I don't know what happened to me, but I must have hurt something in my back that made my right pinky go numb.
Pastor Josh
I could not feel my pinky.
Pastor Josh
And it was the weirdest thing.
Pastor Josh
It was like two weeks, and I kept saying, like, man, I just don't feel my pinky.
Pastor Josh
And Alicia was like, oh, you probably tweaked something in your back.
Pastor Josh
And I'm like, yeah.
Pastor Josh
So all of a sudden, I would just keep hitting it and bumping it and getting it cut and bruised, and I was like, I'm not even feeling this.
Pastor Josh
Eventually, I got the feeling back, and I started, man, why do I keep hurting my pinkies?
Pastor Josh
Because I was so used to not feeling anything that I would just bump it around and not do anything, not care about it, jam it back.
Pastor Josh
I didn't, you know.
Pastor Josh
And then I started feeling that again.
Pastor Josh
I'm like, wow, that's weird.
Pastor Josh
That feels different.
Pastor Josh
And for some of us, the Bible speaks of searing our conscience, so much so that we don't even feel the conviction of the Spirit anymore, folks.
Pastor Josh
That's a dangerous place to be that we have grieved the Holy Spirit so much that we have now seared our conscience to the fact that when the Holy Spirit is calling us, we go, yeah, I just, I'm complacent.
Pastor Josh
I don't care.
Pastor Josh
The Bible says that is the characteristic of these people back at this time is they were so numb to the call of God to be repentant, that they had just been so set in their ways that God says, I have to wake you up.
Pastor Josh
And so please, if anything, be sensitive to the preaching of the Word of God.
Pastor Josh
Be sensitive to what the word of God is leading you to do.
Pastor Josh
The Bible says that when that conviction comes, that is a time to embrace and repent and submit.
Pastor Josh
Because remember that principle.
Pastor Josh
God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.
Pastor Josh
I don't know about you, but I want God's grace.
Pastor Josh
I'm desperate for God's grace.
Pastor Josh
I need God's grace every single day.
Pastor Josh
And so how do I find that grace?
Pastor Josh
By humility.
Pastor Josh
In saying I admit that I am wrong God.
Pastor Josh
First John, chapter one, verse nine.
Pastor Josh
If you confess your sins, he's faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
Pastor Josh
That doesn't mean that we just keep getting resaved over and over and over again.
Pastor Josh
What that means is that yes, I'm saved and yes, I am a child of God, but yet there is something in my relationship with God that I have driven a divide in, in my life.
Pastor Josh
It's like, I use this analogy a lot with Micah.
Pastor Josh
I can pick on Micah, cause he's not here.
Pastor Josh
Micah's my nine year old son.
Pastor Josh
And you know, I know that he loves me and he knows that I love him.
Pastor Josh
He knows that nothing can change in the fact that I'm his dad.
Pastor Josh
But there have been times where I've gotten onto him and he's gotten in trouble and he's gotten so mad that he goes, I'm not talking to you, I'm just gonna, I'm gonna turn around and go somewhere.
Pastor Josh
All right.
Pastor Josh
There has been a break in our fellowship, but there's not a break in our relationship.
Pastor Josh
Right?
Pastor Josh
And so in the relationship, I am his dad, he is my son.
Pastor Josh
But he has turned his back because he's mad at me.
Pastor Josh
And there needs to be that restoration.
Pastor Josh
And so sometimes as Christians, it's not that we lose our salvation, it's because we are so upset with something that God is doing or we're so focused on what we're doing that we have turned our backs against him.
Pastor Josh
He's waiting for that Repentance.
Pastor Josh
He's waiting for that relationship.
Pastor Josh
But we have turned and we need to come back.
Pastor Josh
And that's what biblical revival really is.
Pastor Josh
Biblical revival is not when we go out and get a tent and a preacher yells really loud at us.
Pastor Josh
That can happen at a revival.
Pastor Josh
Okay, I'm not.
Pastor Josh
I'm not opposed to getting under a tent.
Pastor Josh
I like tent meetings.
Pastor Josh
I'm not opposed to a preacher getting a little animated.
Pastor Josh
Animated.
Pastor Josh
I'm not opposed to doing extra music.
Pastor Josh
But that in and of itself is not the revival.
Pastor Josh
The revival is what happens in our heart.
Pastor Josh
Revival starts with repentance.
Pastor Josh
Revival starts with, I need to change what I'm doing to get back to a refreshment and a renewal in my love for God.
Pastor Josh
That is revival.
Pastor Josh
Revival is not more people.
Pastor Josh
Now, more people can be a result of revival, but revival is something that happens in the heart of the individual, between God and the child of God.
Pastor Josh
And so what we can see here in Zephaniah is that God is pursuing them, but he's also warning them of the dangers of rejection, rejecting the conviction.
Pastor Josh
And so what we see in verses 14 through 16, and this will be the last thing we look at here tonight, is the description of the intensity of the judgment.
Pastor Josh
Verse 14.
Pastor Josh
The great day of the Lord is near.
Pastor Josh
It is near and hasteth greatly.
Pastor Josh
Even the voice of the day of the Lord, the mighty man, shall cry there bitterly.
Pastor Josh
Man, I don't know if you just caught that, but what does it say there?
Pastor Josh
It says, in God's judgment, even the voice, the day of the Lord, the mighty man, shall cry there bitterly.
Pastor Josh
Doesn't matter how strong that we are, how powerful that we think we are, God will bring in his judgment, wrath upon everyone, and everybody will feel that.
Pastor Josh
And so what I can see here is that it doesn't matter how much money you have, it doesn't matter how much power you have, it doesn't matter how much position you have.
Pastor Josh
Ultimately, God's judgment will reach us in a place that we will feel.
Pastor Josh
Verse 15.
Pastor Josh
That day is a day of wrath, a day of trouble and distress, a day of wasteness and desolation, a day of darkness and gloominess, a day of clouds and thick darkness, a day of the trumpet and alarm against the fenced cities, against the high towers.
Pastor Josh
And I will bring distress upon men that they shall walk like blind men because they have sinned against the Lord.
Pastor Josh
It shows the reason.
Pastor Josh
God's not arbitrarily just doing this because he doesn't like these people.
Pastor Josh
It's because of their sin.
Pastor Josh
And their blood shall be poured out as dust and their flesh as the dung.
Pastor Josh
Neither there's in this man.
Pastor Josh
Catch this in verse 18.
Pastor Josh
Because there's the certainty of judgment.
Pastor Josh
And then he says, you know what?
Pastor Josh
In judgment, there's nothing that you can do.
Pastor Josh
Neither their silver nor their gold shall be able to deliver them in the day of the Lord's wrath.
Pastor Josh
There will be people.
Pastor Josh
There has been people throughout history that have claimed, hey, you know what?
Pastor Josh
I've got enough money.
Pastor Josh
I can fight this, right?
Pastor Josh
When I stand before God, or if, you know, if God's judging me, I can say, you know, I have enough.
Pastor Josh
I can buy my way out of this.
Pastor Josh
You can't buy your way out of God's judgment.
Pastor Josh
You can't use your silver and gold.
Pastor Josh
You can't use your power.
Pastor Josh
You can't use your persuasion to get away from the Lord's wrath.
Pastor Josh
It says, but the whole land shall be devoured by the fire of his jealousy.
Pastor Josh
And I'm thankful that I serve a jealous God.
Pastor Josh
I know that sometimes people see jealousy as a negative thing.
Pastor Josh
But remember God.
Pastor Josh
Remember his defining attribute.
Pastor Josh
His defining attribute is his holiness.
Pastor Josh
And so when God is jealous, he's perfectly jealous.
Pastor Josh
And what that means is that God doesn't want us to go around and share our love with other people.
Pastor Josh
It's the same thing.
Pastor Josh
Like, I'm jealous for my wife.
Pastor Josh
And the concept, like, okay, I love my wife.
Pastor Josh
I don't want to share her with anybody else.
Pastor Josh
Okay?
Pastor Josh
There's nothing wrong with that.
Pastor Josh
I think that's biblical, right?
Pastor Josh
That.
Pastor Josh
That's that healthy jealousy, right?
Pastor Josh
It's not jealousy.
Pastor Josh
Like, well, I'm jealous of that person's getting good.
Pastor Josh
And that's a selfish jealousy.
Pastor Josh
And so God is jealous over his children because he doesn't want his children going to Moloch and going to these pagan gods.
Pastor Josh
He doesn't want them to go to the world.
Pastor Josh
He doesn't want them to go in their own power.
Pastor Josh
He wants them to see him for who he is and to experience that love.
Pastor Josh
And so it says, they're devoured by the fire of his jealousy.
Pastor Josh
For he shall make even a speedy riddance of all them that dwell in the land.
Pastor Josh
And so this speaks to this idea that no matter what we think we have in our own strength, men might trust in silver and gold, but it will not do them any good in the day of God's judgment.
Pastor Josh
When we stand before God, we cannot appeal to how much money we have, what positions we had within the church, whatever it is, we cannot stand before Him.
Pastor Josh
The only thing that can stand on our account is the blood of Jesus Christ.
Pastor Josh
That's the only thing that matters.
Pastor Josh
Because you know that in Matthew, chapter seven, what happens?
Pastor Josh
You guys know the story.
Pastor Josh
There are all these people standing in front of Jesus, and these people are getting judged.
Pastor Josh
And they're like, wait, I did things for you.
Pastor Josh
I cast out demons.
Pastor Josh
I prophesied in your name.
Pastor Josh
And he says, depart from me.
Pastor Josh
Right?
Pastor Josh
I didn't know you.
Pastor Josh
You're a worker of iniquity.
Pastor Josh
What was the difference?
Pastor Josh
He didn't know them.
Pastor Josh
There wasn't a.
Pastor Josh
And it's not that God doesn't know these people.
Pastor Josh
He knows them intellectually in his omniscience.
Pastor Josh
He's saying, I don't know you personally.
Pastor Josh
And so that's the only distinction at the end of the day, it's the blood of Jesus Christ on our account.
Pastor Josh
That is what we can stand on when it comes to our hope and our faith.
Pastor Josh
And so I would encourage you to think about that not just for your own life, but for the way that we deal with other people around us, how we share our faith with people.
Pastor Josh
Does God want us to be holy people?
Pastor Josh
Yes.
Pastor Josh
But it's the heart of it.
Pastor Josh
It's the heart of holiness.
Pastor Josh
The heart of holiness is that God has done this for me, and I'm responding in repentance and in humility.
Pastor Josh
And that's all of what chapter two is about.
Pastor Josh
We're going to get into our study in chapter two.
Pastor Josh
And it's the desire of God that we seek him, that we seek after Him.
Pastor Josh
And I would encourage you to never lose your desire to seek after God.
Pastor Josh
The moment we get into that place of complacency is the moment that we fall into that delusion that.
Pastor Josh
Remember at the very beginning that deceitfulness.
Pastor Josh
And what I would tell you is this.
Pastor Josh
We have to.
Pastor Josh
And you'll hear this phrase over and over again in my preaching because it's infiltrated my own life and it's helped me understand why sometimes I go astray.
Pastor Josh
And it's this, think biblically about things sometimes.
Pastor Josh
I know the theological truth, but I don't think about it biblically.
Pastor Josh
I take it from the perspective of, I know the Bible says this, but this is different in my situation.
Pastor Josh
I would encourage you to think about everything through the lens of Scripture.
Pastor Josh
And what does that mean for me today?
Pastor Josh
What that means for me today is this.
Pastor Josh
As I come into a place in my life where I might say, you know what?
Pastor Josh
Trust my heart.
Pastor Josh
Right?
Pastor Josh
I'm gonna trust my heart.
Pastor Josh
You Know, I'm gonna use a silly analogy.
Pastor Josh
It's this, like, maybe you're watching a movie, and the main character at the end of the story says, you know what I'm gonna do?
Pastor Josh
I'm gonna go to my friend and he's gonna give me this advice.
Pastor Josh
And the friend goes up to him and says, just trust your heart.
Pastor Josh
Trust your heart and everything will be fine.
Pastor Josh
And at the end of the movie, the person trusts their heart and they come out on top and everything works out.
Pastor Josh
And what we could be tempted to do is think, well, if it worked for that person on Netflix or whatever movie you're watching, then that must be able to work for me.
Pastor Josh
And I know this is silly, but you guys see how this worldly wisdom seeps in.
Pastor Josh
And so we start thinking, I know the Bible says this, but it worked for that.
Pastor Josh
And so therefore, what I'm going to do is I'm going to trust my heart.
Pastor Josh
What does the Bible say about that?
Pastor Josh
Well, thinking biblically, the Bible says that our heart is wicked, it's deceitful, it's going to lie to us because our heart wants what the heart wants.
Pastor Josh
And that's the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eyes, the pride of life.
Pastor Josh
And so, just in that little simple conversation, that simple analogy, we can see how something from the world can infiltrate our minds and sound good, but it's not, because it's not thinking biblically.
Pastor Josh
So we go back to repentance.
Pastor Josh
Let's think about repentance and judgment.
Pastor Josh
If I start telling myself, well, everything's okay because I don't see the world on fire right now, maybe some of you are like, I think the world is on fire.
Pastor Josh
But maybe in your own life, you might say, everything's going okay, I must be okay.
Pastor Josh
The truth is, is that it's sometimes when we least expect in our lives that we can fall into the trap of complacency.
Pastor Josh
Because I'm hoping that most of you are not struggling with BAAL worship.
Pastor Josh
If you are struggling with BAAL worship, come talk to me after the service.
Pastor Josh
We need to have an intervention or Moloch.
Pastor Josh
Okay?
Pastor Josh
Either one of those might be getting you in trouble here.
Pastor Josh
But here's the thing.
Pastor Josh
So a lot of times it's not that, but sometimes it's.
Pastor Josh
And sometimes it seeps in very, very subtly.
Pastor Josh
We start to make a little bit of a compromise.
Pastor Josh
We allow the worldly ways.
Pastor Josh
We wear the foreign apparel.
Pastor Josh
Now, I'm not talking about, like, foreign apparel.
Pastor Josh
Like, we have our international meal and people dress up.
Pastor Josh
I'M not talking about that.
Pastor Josh
I'm talking about the apparel of the world, right?
Pastor Josh
And we try to look like the world enough just to get into that system and just get enough of that.
Pastor Josh
And the Bible says, hey, you know what?
Pastor Josh
Don't be the way of the world.
Pastor Josh
And so that might be a temptation for you.
Pastor Josh
You might say, you know what?
Pastor Josh
I've allowed the world's ways.
Pastor Josh
I've worn the foreign apparel.
Pastor Josh
I've allowed myself to get to a place where I try to be a little bit like the world and a little bit like what God tells me to be.
Pastor Josh
But then it might be this, it might be that you are that person.
Pastor Josh
That's.
Pastor Josh
Maybe you're not literally a fish merchant or a silver merchant, but you've allowed your possessions to grip you, to hold you in.
Pastor Josh
You know, it's not wrong to have something.
Pastor Josh
It's wrong if that something has you.
Pastor Josh
And so I would encourage you to think about that materialism in your life.
Pastor Josh
Man, I struggle with that.
Pastor Josh
I can be honest with you guys.
Pastor Josh
I'm always honest with you guys.
Pastor Josh
I try to be honest with you guys.
Pastor Josh
And I try to be as transparent as I can be as a pastor.
Pastor Josh
Sometimes it's hard when I'm driving through my neighbor and I see my neighbor gets this new car.
Pastor Josh
It's like, I want that.
Pastor Josh
Why can't I have that?
Pastor Josh
Or I see a house come up on the market and I go, I want that bigger house.
Pastor Josh
I want that nicer thing.
Pastor Josh
And that materialism can seep into my life.
Pastor Josh
And without me even knowing, that's what my lifeblood is, that's what I desire.
Pastor Josh
Well, if I could just have this, I'll be happy.
Pastor Josh
I'm going to tell you every single time in my life, when I have obtained something that I thought I want, it might have been good for a moment and then it fell off.
Pastor Josh
It's like, what?
Pastor Josh
I want more.
Pastor Josh
I want something different.
Pastor Josh
I want something better.
Pastor Josh
That's what that's talking about there with those merchants.
Pastor Josh
They just wanted more and they wanted more, and they just kept consuming and desiring.
Pastor Josh
Folks die to the material desires.
Pastor Josh
Is it wrong to have material things?
Pastor Josh
No.
Pastor Josh
Jesus had, you know, clothes and food.
Pastor Josh
He didn't have a house.
Pastor Josh
But we know at least at that time, Jesus had to take in certain things.
Pastor Josh
And there was, you know, they had money, they had to buy food.
Pastor Josh
And so there wasn't anything wrong with having something.
Pastor Josh
But it's that idea of desiring materialism before anything else.
Pastor Josh
And then we see, I think, the group of People that we all probably fall into the most is that complacent group, that group that just isn't affected by God's word.
Pastor Josh
It isn't affected by God's teaching.
Pastor Josh
And we just say, you know, it'll be okay, it'll be okay.
Pastor Josh
When is pastor gonna get done?
Pastor Josh
My football team's on at 1:00.
Pastor Josh
We gotta get out of here.
Pastor Josh
We gotta get food.
Pastor Josh
I mean, I've been there, I've been sitting in a service and all I could think about is what I was gonna eat after the service.
Pastor Josh
I'm like, oh, where are we going to eat today?
Pastor Josh
I can't wait for that now.
Pastor Josh
Not so much anymore.
Pastor Josh
I'm kind of distracted during the preaching, but back when I was in the pews, that's sometimes what I would think about.
Pastor Josh
And the truth is that Satan will not always use just out and out evil things to distract us.
Pastor Josh
He'll just use things that we like and he will distract us with that.
Pastor Josh
Fathers, he'll distract you in how you're raising your children.
Pastor Josh
Wives will distract you on how you're raising your children.
Pastor Josh
It, it'll be all the way across the board.
Pastor Josh
He's trying to get us to keep our eyes off of the thing that matters.
Pastor Josh
Now we have an election coming up, okay?
Pastor Josh
And everyone's waiting their bated breath about what, you know, we're going to say about this.
Pastor Josh
I'm going to say this.
Pastor Josh
I think you should get involved.
Pastor Josh
I.
Pastor Josh
This is my personal preference.
Pastor Josh
Vote how God is leading you to vote.
Pastor Josh
Be involved.
Pastor Josh
Don't just be a bystander, okay?
Pastor Josh
That's my opinion.
Pastor Josh
You could have a different opinion.
Pastor Josh
I'm not going to tell you who to vote for, but I'm going to tell you to vote for the way that God leads you to vote and according to his word.
Pastor Josh
But I will say this, I will say this.
Pastor Josh
Politics can become a distraction.
Pastor Josh
I'm not saying that it is a distraction in and of itself, but it can be a distraction.
Pastor Josh
And so what we have to do is we have to deal with it and think about it.
Pastor Josh
What do we say biblically?
Pastor Josh
Think about it biblically.
Pastor Josh
Now I'm going to tell you, I'm going to tell you for the most part, I can tell you one thing.
Pastor Josh
There will be a lot of people next week, or however long it takes, there will be a lot of people that are going to be upset.
Pastor Josh
That's one thing I can say very clearly in our country that I feel like I'm very confident I'll be right there.
Pastor Josh
Will be a lot of people upset.
Pastor Josh
And the truth is, one way or the other, people are going to be upset.
Pastor Josh
And what I would tell you to do is pray.
Pastor Josh
Pray for the Lord to work.
Pastor Josh
But what I will say is that understand that our world is not shaken.
Pastor Josh
If somebody is somewhere that we don't agree with our King of kings and our Lord of Lords is Jesus Christ, there are people that we can vote for.
Pastor Josh
There are people that we can trust.
Pastor Josh
There are people that we can say, you know what?
Pastor Josh
I think that they're better here or better there.
Pastor Josh
But what I will tell you is that Jesus Christ is the one that we look to.
Pastor Josh
And so, again, this is not a message to say, you, you better go do this, you better go do that.
Pastor Josh
But I will say, and I would encourage you to be a part of this, to speak the truth of the word of God.
Pastor Josh
And so this is always going to be my guide because this will never fail me.
Pastor Josh
The people have failed me.
Pastor Josh
People have failed me.
Pastor Josh
My possessions have failed me.
Pastor Josh
Everything.
Pastor Josh
My health has failed me.
Pastor Josh
And so what do we do?
Pastor Josh
We point the truth to what has never failed.
Pastor Josh
And the Bible says, the grass will fail.
Pastor Josh
The grass will fade, the flesh will fail, but the word of God will stand forever.
Pastor Josh
And I will tell you that the word of God is where we set everything in.
Pastor Josh
So repentance.
Pastor Josh
What does that mean?
Pastor Josh
That means that when the Word of God is spoken to me, I listen.
Pastor Josh
And so I would encourage you to do that, not just this week, but for the rest of your life.
Pastor Josh
And know that as God judges, he also offers.
Pastor Josh
He offers forgiveness.
Pastor Josh
He offers grace.
Pastor Josh
But that only comes to those that humble themselves in submission to the Lord.
Pastor Josh
So we're going to look at next week what it means to seek the Lord in the midst of judgment.
Pastor Josh
Thank you again for listening to the Middletown Baptist Church podcast.
Pastor Josh
I hope that this sermon has been a blessing for you.
Pastor Josh
If you would like to find out more information about our church or this sermon, you can find us at middletownbaptistchurch.org or find us on Facebook or YouTube.
Pastor Josh
You can also email me directly at joshmusaroiddletownbaptistchurch dot com if you've enjoyed this podcast.
Pastor Josh
Please subscribe and follow along for future podcasts and updates.
Pastor Josh
Thank you so much.
Pastor Josh
God bless.
Pastor Josh
Have a wonderful day.
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