Is The Church In Trouble?

0:01 All right, this morning, we were going to go to Romans chapter two, verse one, and look at the next Therefore, as we go through the Book of Romans, looking at all the their furs. But because people being out this morning and things kind of going in a different direction, what we're going to do is we're going to discuss a subject that has been talked about pretty much my entire Christian life, and over and over and over and over and over. It is stated within the church, it's stated on Christian radio, it's stated in Christian publications, it's stated in Bible College and seminary over and over and over that the Church in America is in trouble, that we are in danger of full blown collapse, and it's all going to be over. And I was greatly influenced by that in my early Christian life, that the Church is in trouble, the Church is in trouble. And then I think in some ways it makes sense for those in Bible College and seminary to hear that, because then you're motivated to do what get done with Bible college, get a seminary, and then go out there and do what revolutionize everything, change everything. At the same time, obviously, I don't think it's just a marketing employee for seminaries and Bible colleges. But we know within Christianity throughout, depending on the specific time, usually with about every within ten of maybe fifteen years, someone comes forward with a new idea, a new concept, a new book, a new plan to fix the church. Right, And we could go through all the different movements, we could go through the revival movements

1:34 of say Finny, we could go throughout throughout church history, and someone will come forward and they're like, this is what the church needs, right, we need a revival movement, or we need well we need amend's ministries like promise Keepers, or we need we need the purpose driven church, we need secret sensitive And then churches are always changing because they're trying to continue to do what to survive, but continue to because whether we like it or not, okay, And this is the negative part of church that in most cases churches are very much a business. And there's no way to get around denying that, right, because what do churches need to survive? They need people, and then they need those people to do what to give money?

2:20 And why do they need the money? You gotta pay the bills, right, okay, because churches can't just operate. The buildings cost things, right, the uh keep everything going. And then if you want programs and activities, they cost things. And depending on some churches, you would be utterly shocked how much money churches spend for curriculum for Sunday school classes. Like, that's a crazy amount of money. So you got it. What do you have to keep doing? You gotta keep bringing in people? Right, So if things are going, if people are leaving, then you got to come up with a new and I know this sounds there's nothing spiritual about any of this. You got to come up with a new marketing plan. Right, how are we going to advertise or we send out? Depending on where you live.

3:04 You live in Apple, probably about every couple of months you get some flyer from Beltleigh, Right, you're gonna get from some one of the big churches. And that costs lots of money to produce those, right, And so why because they gotta keep bringing in people And according to some studies, you have to bring in thirty people per year just to maintain thirty people a year just to stay where you are. Why because there's such turnover, right, people leave, people leave, people lead. That's just to stay where you are now. If you want to grow, you've got to bring in more than thirty a year. That's just that's just a cycle that you never can get anywhere.

3:48 You can't get anywhere with that cycle, and it just puts a lot of pressure on everyone. So in many cases, pastor's job is really to do what well. He's got to motivate the people, to go out and bring in people only to maintain everything's going. And then what is the pastor also what else does he have to be very careful with doing? Can't tick off anybody. You make the wrong people mad, then they're out. And then and then this is where it can be very dangerous that if the pastor knows who gives the most as much as a pastor may try to separate himself from the finances. If usually you can figure it out, and once you figure it out, then what are you afraid to do?

4:32 I can't tick off them because they're paying for them, right, So then them becomes the people You're like, Okay, well this may offend them, but they don't give as much as them, So I'm not gonna have everything about it because that's just it's disgusting. Right, nobody gets in the ministry thinking that's the way they want it to be. Right, you get in the ministry, you have all of these ideas and these concepts, and then you get into it and you're like, what has happened? This has turned into something I never envisioned. Right, You got people mad about this, you got people ticked off here. But you know, if they leave, then you don't have the money for this. You don't have the money for this, and then you've got your own selfish You may not get any money, and then what do you do for a living? Right, So then you have to be bivocational. And the people in the church may think that's wonderful and spiritual, but we know the detriment that can have one's family. So it's always this never ending cycle of, well, the church is in trouble. The church is in trouble because there's an entire basically it's almost like a entire industry of people trying to tell you what how to fix it, how to fix it, how to grow at church. There's books written about it. And so as everyone continues to try to figure that out, you've got all of these concerns and churches are always so much of what a church does. They may say it's evangelism, but in reality, what is it? Just business growth strategy keeping the doors open.

6:01 I know you'll like, deep down, no, no, no, we want to get we want to bring people to Christ. You want to bring people to the church because without the people in the church, your church is not going to survive. And I hate that, right, I wish there was. There's no really easy way to fix it. There's no really easy way to fix it other than trying to say, well, well, I think when you're young you can come in saying I'm going to fix it, right, and I don't care who I tick off, right, And it depending on where where your situation is, right, like if you if you're not dependent upon the church for money, the pastor can be much more what get mad at me, I don't care, I don't need you, right, So that's a good thing, right, But it can also at the same time then that can hurt their church from ever growing. So it's such a I hate the entire thing. So the constant cry is the church is in trouble. The church is in trouble.

6:59 And on one hand, you can see you can kind of understand why there is concern. At the same time, you can see that maybe sometimes it's more manufactured because someone is gonna get Look, anytime someone says the church is in trouble, what almost always follows that, order my book, come to my conference, buy my video, because I have the answer, and you need to give me money in order to get the end. Oh you see how wrong? That just feels right? That feels wrong. So at the same time, it also can be self serving for a pastor if the pastor stands behind the pulpit and tell everyone the church out there is a mess, the church is in trouble. Therefore you need basically me or you need this church that can kind of become their own marketing.

7:51 I see that even that could be fleshly right. So there's no real great way to ever put it. This way, we can all dogmatically say this, the church will never be what what can we say? The church perfect? Never going to be perfect. It's always going to be a mess, right, It's always going to be flawed motivations, it's going to be corrupt, it's gonna be it's never gonna be perfect. And why is it never going to be perfect? That everyone in it is what imperfect and it's a sinner right when what we do not stop sinning because we become a Christian right, And to think that way is just a flawed understanding of the entire Gospel. Right, we are saved by what kind of righteousness? Imputed? Meaning it's a legal declaration. It doesn't make me righteous. I'm just declared to be righteous because christ righteousness is accredited to me. Right.

8:50 Remember that's the entire Protestant Reformation hinges on that fact. Catholicism says you are infused with righteousness, and the Protestant says, righteousness is imputed or accredited to your account. I'm declared to be that which I am not. Right. That's a radical difference, correct, But that's great from a thiological standpoint, But from a practical standpoint, that makes things complicated in the Church because you've got a bunch of people who are declared to be righteous but who are not righteous, including the best right. So that makes it messy, right, and then you have money considerations building, and then you see where it can just turn into a mess. So all of those things are factual issues. At the same time, it's constantly said the churches is in trouble. The churches in trouble, the church is in trouble at the same time, depending on one's eschatology or study of the end times.

9:48 At the same time, we feel that there is scriptural support saying the church is only going to get worse. And then that's two Timothy chapter three. Will at least look at this this morning, or yeah, fast approach afternoon. Second Timothy chapter three. We can at least look at this, right everybody there secon Timothy chapter three, verse one. But know this that in the last days, right, the last days? What kind of times are coming? Perilous times will come? Now typically a lot of churches. How is this read? They read this as describing the culture. And my argument is, this is not written to describe the culture. This is written to describe what the church is going to look like.

10:37 And then what does it say that in the last days perilous times will come for men will be lovers of themselves. That don't tell me that's not inside the church, that's inside every church? Right? What else? Lovers of money? Don't tell me that's not inside the church, that's inside every church? What else? Boasters proud in fact, I think that's us the key to Christianity, right, Okay, because we think we're always better than everyone else. Right. Blasphemers maybe maybe in certain ways, Okay, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving slanderers, without self control, brutal despisers of good, traders, headstrong, haughtie.

11:24 And then look, this is the one where I know this. This, this is the thing that makes me know this is referring to the church. What does it say, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God? Now that's never If you're going to say in the last days this is the way it is going to be, people outside of Christianity would always be lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God. That would def that defines the world. Right. So what Paul is warning Timothy this is going to be the condition of the church. Now. The issue is that phrase the last days. Now, some people believe the last days begin win with the ascension of Christ, basically that when Christ descended, basically the last days began. Some people believe the last days. There's always some kind of argument on when they started do what right stage, So there's some argument, but almost everyone believes that we are definitely in the last days, right, So, and the point is that describes the church, does it? Not lovers of pleasure more than lovers of God? Look, the church is filled with that as well, don't don't we as Christians, we may try to act like but we love pleasures more than God. And there's every statistical study in the world demonstrates that. Right, Christians, Christians love pleasure more than lovers of God. If we didn't, Christians would be doing what all the time we'd be reading, studying, praying, going to church. Back in the early church? How many times did they meet every single day? Do we do that

12:57 anymore in church? No? Right? And then churches bring in entertainment, they bring activities, they bring fun because guess what, that's what we like, right, having a form of godliness. That's another reason we know this is the church having a form of godliness but denying its power, and from such people turn away for these sorts or those who crept into houses and make captive of gulible women, loaded down with sins, led away by various lusts. This is referring to what's going to happen in the church. Paul is warning Timothy, this is what's coming to the church. Paul was telling Timothy that. So Paul knew that this was already happening. And we see this happening, right you read that?

13:41 Does that not sound like the Church of Corinth? That sounds like the Church of Corinth. So during the Biblical times, this was already occurring, and it was already happening, and it's inevitable, this is what's going to happen in the church. So can in some ways, what can we say? The church has always been in trouble. Us always been in trouble, and it's only going to get worse. Right now, trying to figure all of this out is always complicated. So since this morning, since everything kind of got messed up, and I wanted to, you know, continue in our study in Romans, but we're gonna just discuss this because I was sent an article and I was going to use it for the podcast, but I was sent an article about basically, is the church and trouble? Well inevitably the obvious answer is yes, because in some ways it's always been in trouble. And why is it in trouble because of us? Now, historically the church tends to try to put itself that we're in trouble because of the bad people out there. Right. We like to play the victim.

14:49 Oh they don't like us, Oh we're being persecuted. The church loves to take that particular stance. But really the issue is inside the church. Paul's warnings typically to any of the churches he wrote the problems were where in the church. Paul didn't write and say, watch out for those people outside of the church. The problems always inside. It always is with us. But it's much easier if you put the focus out there, because why if you have to deal with the problem and here, what's inevitably going to happen. You're gonna tick someone off. And as soon as they get ticked off, where do they go? They go right out the front door and they go to another church. And then the church has to deal with all those financial issues that we were discussing. You see how it's like the church's problems. Our system almost creates a system which they cannot be ultimately wide fixed because to address it is inevitably you're going to do what lose someone, you make a change, what's almost inevitably going to happen, you're going to lose someone like you can't.

15:56 You almost have to kind of figure out, okay, you find the perfect stre and then you're just like, okay, I've got the majority happy, and if the minority is unhappy, you try to just as as quickly as possible, do what get them through? Go go, go, go go, because as long as I got to maintain a balance. And that's kind of that's kind of messed up the way it works, right, But this is this is what's it's been in the church. This describes the church, all right. I know if you go to most churches and they preach this, they act like, hey, what's the news? Pay attention to what's going on in Hollywood? This is what? No, that's not them. This is us, all right. So let's read this again that in the last days, peer list times will come. Let's go through them again. What's the first description? Lovers of themselves? Is that not? Where aren't we just built that way because of our sensful nature?

16:51 Lovers of money? Okay, come on, churches love money just like people love money, right a right? Love them boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents. I'm thankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving slanderers without self control, brutal despisers of good traders, headstrong, haughty lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of Godliness but denying its power. I think that that's inevitably. You may you can always go find one thing there and try to say well, and it covers so many things that it's hard for no one to say, well, I kind of fit in there. We all fit in there somewhere somehow, so well, I want to do relatively quickly.

17:37 We'll see where this goes. We're going to work through this article. The name of this article is is the Body of Christ in Trouble? And this was sent to me Is the Body of Christ in Trouble? And this was published September the twelfth, twenty twenty four, so meaning once again it's now. But I can find articles from two thousand, nineteen ninety five, nineteen eighty five, nineteen nineteen sixty five, eighteen hundred, seventeen hundred, sixteen hundred. I mean a loser doctor Church was in trouble in the fifteen hundred. I mean we could go on and because in every every decade this same thing typically happens, all right, And this is from Grace Ministries. Bible College is from a Bible college, okay, which is where you typically start hearing how bad sometimes it's weird. Sometimes you hear about how bad the church is in Bible College. But inside the church you almost have to kind of play it off like everything's good, other than when you're trying to convince the people here that everything is good where here. Everything is bad out there because you want the people to stay here. Okay, So there's the selfish, selfish motivation that can come into play. So what do you think they start their argument with. This is where they start with.

18:51 According to Pew Research Center, they did a survey on the fundamentals of the Christian faith. Right, so this is where they contact Christians and they basically ask about the fundamentals of the faith. Right, these are the basics, and we talk about the fundamentals. And remember the Fundamentals of the faith was in trouble when remember this, I tell everyone constantly, I've been for twenty something years to read these books, the four volumes on the Fundamentals. This is in the nineteen hundreds, early nineteen hundreds, And what was the problem. They were worried about the fundamentals. Okay, we can go all the way back to Luther. Luther was worried about the what I thought the fundamentals were. That's why the early Church was creating what catechisms, creeds, because there's always been a fight trying to define the fundamentals and then getting what people to believe and adhere to them. Right, that's why we have the Apostles, Creed, the nice and the Ethnician Creed. We can go through all throughout church history. Right. So, but according to this study, half of US Protestants, so this removes this removes Catholics, right, Half of us Protestants say faith alone is needed to get into heaven. That sounds good, right, But on one hand, isn't that shocking?

20:16 Only forty six percent a Protestant say faith alone is needed to get into heaven. Only forty six percent. All right, ladies and gentlemen, that's okay, that's the end of that. That means someone needs to go find Luther's grave and wake him up and tell him what you lost? You failed. Only forty six percent Faith alone for salvation is the the I mean, that's the battle cry of the Protestant Reformation. So then what I mean, how do you what do you do when you see that statistic? But it gets worse, So only forty six percent agree to that. Are you ready for this? Fifty two percent say both good deeds and faith are needed. So that's a full blown rejection of sola fide. I mean, we go through all the solos of their reformation, it's all the Protestant Reformation failed.

21:18 In twenty twenty four, we can announce the Protestant Reformation was a failure. And that's frustrating because typically in October thirty first, what are most churches running around here doing. They're doing fall festivals, trunk or treat yelling and screaming about the evils Halloween. And what should they be doing on October thirty first? You think they would be studying the Reformation, which is literally and from a historical perspective, almost the birth of Protestantism. I know independent Baptist would make a different argument, but we get the idea. From a historical perspective, we don't. We're not even agreeing with our own history that I mean, like that's when I read that, I was like, well, I'm I'm just gonna give up, all right, I'm just gonna go find a liquor store and just be done. Because this is what is that? Right? Only forty six percent of the participants say the Bible is the sole source of religious authority for Christians. So forty six percent say faith alone. That's already less than half. And then another forty six percent come along and say the only forty six that the Bible is the sole source of religious authority. So if the Bible, so that's what sola scriptura out the window, sola fide, I mean, we can go through all so la gratia, all of the solas are just finished, Like i'd how do you respond to these things? I don't

22:54 even know what you do? Right, So, and now I've argued it forty six percent saying the Bible's the final authority. You even know that there's a bigger problem even with the forty six percent, because the forty six percent say the Bible's the final authority, and we know reality, who's the final authority, the individual, which is already a bigger problem. And that's a problem within Protestantism, right, Okay, what Catholicism would say, the Church has the authority, right, so we already know there's an nbajor problem here, right. However, fifty two percent say Christians should look both to the Bible and to the church's official teaching and traditions for guidance. That sounds very Catholic. That sounds very Catholic, all right, So so I don't even know what you do with that.

23:40 I mean, what we're finding out is that everything is just a total mess, is what we're finding out. Only thirty percent, only thirty percent of those surveyed believe faith in God alone is needed for salvation and that the Bible provides all the guidance Christians need only thirty percent. However, only eighteen percent believe faith in God alone but not the Bible as the soul source. Another seventeen percent don't believe faith in God alone, but says the Bible is the sole source of guidance. So they're like, there's that's even a contradiction there. All I needs faith alone, No, I need scripture, Like it's just all over the place.

24:24 And basically, how I mean, I've been saying it for twenty well more than twenty four years. The church is just I mean, I think it's fair to say is covered in philological illiteracy. There's biblical literacy, there's pillological illiteracy. But whenever you say, how do we fix the biblical and philological illiteracy, nobody wants the answer, right, because then churches would start focusing on deep teaching in seat of entertainment and what happens when you really try to go deep and really well? We transitioned. We transitioned from a church that taught theology to a church that now does theology.

25:05 That doesn't work well? Does it? Because doing theology creates what makes people mad? Right? Because what do we do when we do theology? We question, we challenge, We create hypotheses, and then we test those theological hypotheses. Just over what in the last couple of months, what have we done? We completely came up with a radical different way to interpret Romans one eighteen to the end of the chapter. Right then we took the parable of the sewer. We flipped that completely on its head. But we considered every possible interpretation, and we challenge those interpretations because we are not bound by a tradition. What we should be bound by is the text. And if the text allows us to question and challenge that then we will. But people don't like that. They just want to come to church and get three nice little points and get out by noon, and that they did something of great meaning, when in reality they don't even remember what was preached by that evening.

26:05 So then everyone's just playing a little game, right, and they kind of go to church more out of what reason, tradition or obligation. All right, So the article then has this Houston, we have a problem. Red lights flashing, alarms blaring. That's how I felt when I read these results. It says we are talking about Christians. The body of Christ is in trouble. Many of the men and women who go to church Sunday after Sunday don't understand the common faith, which it means to earnestly contend for the faith. And jud Chater, well, there's not chapters Jude verse three, right, which says to earnestly contend for the faith. Why was Jude trying to earnestly contend for the faith? Because there was a problem. Now, on one hand, though, that tells me what has been from the very beginning. So on one end, we should not then panic, going, well, the church is in trouble. The church has always been in trouble.

27:09 I guess that's what I want to drive. The church has always been in trouble. There's always this struggle within the church. And why is the struggle within the church because you have competing interest right, what are the competing interests? Well, the one interest is to do what bring in people so that they give money so that you can continue to maintain the building. You can build, You can have programs, you can have activities. Why do you need the programs and activities so you can bring in the people, And then you've got to keep doing things in order to keep the people that you brought in to keep paying for all of those things. So that's a competing interest. On the other side, there is the idea that what do the people need when they need theology, they need church history, they need doctrine, they need to understand the Hebrew, they need to understand Greek, they need to understand these theological terms. Well, the problem is if you push that, what almost inevitably happens. Do you begin to lose people?

28:06 And if you begin to lose people, then the other factor of money, and now you end up in a mess. In the church. And that's the struggle within the church. And how do you now churches, many churches who try to do a lot of those things. They will tell you what we're doing good teaching. We're doing good teaching. Inevitably, when you review the teaching is not near as good as they make it sound. Out it sounds good because the pastors can be trained to speak in an authoritative way. Make it sound good, give you three good points. You think, oh, we really studied the text. And then you just ask people basic questions about the text, and almost inevitably they cannot answer them because they didn't actually do what study the text? Well, how do you fix this? So on one end, the problem's always been there, but there is I think what we can say is what there's no what, There's no ultimate way to fix this. There's no easy answer, right, there is really no easy answer. And how to fix it?

29:13 I mean, obviously they couldn't fix it. They didn't fix it in the New Testament era. Right, was Paul able to fix it? No? Was John able to fix it? No? I know? And then what did the early church tried to fix it? They tried to fix it with the councils, right, did that fix everything? No, it just the church became more and more divided, more and more divided, more divided. And then by time Luther comes down to the scene in the fifteen hundreds, by the time he takes it, he writes his ninety five thesis, the church is a total, absolute mess. I mean, the church is so messed up it's not even funny. Then then the Luther thinks he's got the solution. Post the ninety five thesis, the Protestant Reformation happens, and then how long did that last? Well, then ediately the Protestants started fighting with whom each other, and then they split, and they split, and they split, and they split, and they split and they split. And now we're I mean, depending on which source you look at, thousands of denominations, thousands upon thousands upon thousands, and we have no it's just a total and complete mess, all right.

30:24 So he goes on to say that most Christians don't understand the common faith. Right, So then they go on to say this, what Scripture says about the children of Visual and Jeremiah and Hosea is prophetic about the body of Christ today. Now, immediately when I read this, I already have problems, right, because he's worried about the person who writes the article this Bible college is Hey, we got an issue because the church is a mess. So then he wants to find scripture to address the problems in the church, and he goes to the books of Jeremiah and Hosea. Now, you can'trest if you're going to address the problem, you go to address the problem in somewhat of a meaningful way, right, because what's the problem with going to Jeremiah and Hosea. Okay, yeah, Jeremiah and Hosea are dealing with issues facing either the Northern Kingdom and the Southern Kingdom or the combined Kingdom. So let's look at the We're gonna look at the scriptures that they offer and see where we go. Here. Are you ready, all right? Jeremiah chapter two, verse thirteen. Go to Jeremiah chapter two, verse thirteen. Oh, we already know we have problems here Jeremiah chapter two. Right now, before we look at the particular verse, let's go back and let's try

31:56 to establish some kind of context. Right, Let's go to Jaiah chapter two, verse one. That's a good place to start, don't you think. Moreover, the word of the Lord came to me. Who's the me? Jeremiah saying, go cry in the hearing of Jerusalem, go and hear in the Christ. So who is he to go speak to Jerusalem? Right? I mean, that's what the text says. You don't have to figure out a Bible college to figure that out, right, saying that says the Lord, I remember you in some translations thee and other translations. Who is now Jeremiah is recording the words of God? And God is thing I remember you? Or Thee? Who is the you and the Thee?

32:44 He's referencing Jerusalem or Israel? Correct, the kindness of your youth, the love of your betrothal when you went after me in the wilderness, and a land not sown Israel was holiness to the Lord. The first fruits of his increase. All the devour him will offend. Disaster will come upon them, says the Lord. He even tells you who he's referring to. Who's referring to Israel. There's nothing to do with the church. Now, we'll see how the article's gonna use this. But I'm already concerned. Right. So the articles like, hey, the church is a mess. They don't even understand the fundamentals of the faith. And how am I going to address it by going to a passage that's not about the Church? Well, that's problem right now. If he wants to say, let's look at how Israel acted and then we'll compare it to the Church, maybe he's going to do that. But I just want you to see clearly who's he referring to.

33:43 You See look at verse four. If you need more clear more evidence, hear the word of the Lord, oh house of Jacob, all the families of the House of Israel. I mean, come on, you don't You don't even need Bible college or seminary to figure it is that. You need basic reading comprehension that you're supposed to learn in school. Right. If you need more help, look at verse six. Neither did they say, where is the Lord who brought us up out of the land of Who is that Israel? Who led us through the Who's that Israel through the land? And he goes on and on and on. I brought you into a bountiful country. Who did he bring into a country? Israel? All right? You read about it in the Bible, all right? We read about the wilderness wanderings, and then we have them coming into to the land, so you can tell who all this is referencing. I don't think there's any way to understand. I mean, I mean, it's just so I don't I just get frustrated. But go to verse thirteen. This is the verse they want us to read. All right, first three words for my people?

35:00 Now who are my people? As a reference to Israel, you could just put Israel right there if you need to. Now, what did his people do? They have committed to evils? So what evils did Israel commit? Number one, they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters. And secondly they have funed themselves cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water. Just to make sure that there's no confusion, very next verse Israel. The very next verse seven mentions Israel. So this is God's words to his people Israel and the sins that they had committed against him. And we know that He's going to go after them over and over and over and over in the Book of Jeremiah. And then ultimately what's going to happen before the Book of Jeremiah is over which captivity Babylonian captivity, right them primarily when we say Israel, well that's a generic we're referring to both. But in this particular case, this is the Southern Kingdom, and the Southern Kingdom goes into Babylonian captivity for how long? Seventy years? And so Jeremiah's warning them that judgment is coming. What happened to the Northern Kingdom Assyrian captivity and they never really come out. Judah goes into Babylonian captivity to be returned to come back out of it. Right, so we know the historical context. Remember we spent half a year in the Book of Jeremiah,

36:32 so we should know that. Really, well, so what does he think he's going to do? What do they think they're going to do with this? Right? They just quoted it. Let's see, are you ready? The individuals and the Pew Research survey shows levels of disagreement with what the Bible says about faith and the role of the Bible plays and how we are to live. And you and I know when that happens, people are creating doctrine that works for them, cisterns they are willing to drink from the Bible says this is evil. Now you see what he just did there. Okay, he's saying that when we look at this survey, they're creating their own doctrine. That is very true. They have departed from the fundamentals of the faith, that is very true. But he's trying to draw a parallel between this word to Judah that they'd une out their own cisterns, and that's what Christians are doing today.

37:25 You can try to draw a parallel if you want. We just got to make sure we make it very clear this is about Judah. Now, I think I could go to New Testament passages and probably do a better job of doing this than going to this one, because you create the confusion. If you're trying to address people who've left the fundamentals of the faith, the last thing you need to do is in the U Scripture in a way that could possibly only lead to confusion. I got no problem saying something like, what remember what Israel dead? The Church does the same thing. Why do we do the same thing as Israel. We're all sinners, all right, So there maybe would be a better way to approach it. Okay, so all right, he doesn't do horrible with that, But okay, but now says, go to Joseah chapter four, Hosea chapter four, And you know I get nervous already, right, I don't even need to go back to chapter one, verse one for this. Look at Hoseiah chapter four, verse one. Doesn't take a lot of time to figure out. Once again, what's being spoken of here, Hosea chapter four, verse one.

38:34 Let me know if you're there, hear the word of the Lord. The children have Israel, for the Lord brings a charge against the inhabitants of the land. Do you see that? Clearly this has a historical context. Right, So what verse do you think he wants us to look at? He wants us to look at verse six. Now what does it say? First two words my people? Okay, Now, immediately that's a reference to Israel. Okay, that drives me crazy. Hell, but this kind of stuff happens in churches all the time, even when they're addressing the problems in the church that continue to perpetuate the same problem. All right, my people are destroyed for lock of knowledge? All right? Now, what is he going to say here? It says in verse one.

39:28 Now I do I like this about the article in verse one? The Lord has an issue with the children of Israel. Can we all applied? All right? Yet's good? That's really good, right, because there is no truth, nor mercy, nor knowledge of God in the land. And the Lord gives us the reason why in verse six, my people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge. Because thou hast rejected knowledge. I will also reject thee that thou shalt be, that thou shalt be no priest to me. Seeing that has forgotten the law of thy God, I will also forget get thy children. When we look at Jeremiah and Hoseiah together, we see that the people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge, because they are determining for themselves who God is and how he is to be served. Now, I think there is a parallel between what Israel does and what the Church does. So in that sense we can agree, right, Israel and the Church are run a parallel course, do we not? We do so? Right? And what is true of both courses? Both paths sinners who act in very similar ways. Now the question comes down to now, so let's let's go ahead and draw a parallel.

40:45 Let's do this all right? So now you've got your thinking caps on, because I'm going to present you the problem. Right. Israel had this problem throughout their entire history, right through their entire history, and it got really bad for them, right, really really bad for them, because ultimately God in the flesh came to his own Israel offered them the kingdom, and they killed the king. Right, And so what happens in seventy a D. They're wiped off the face of the earth. Gone, seventy a D. They're done, right, and they basically don't exist as a nation until nineteen forty eight, all right, So but we can see the parallel of them and all of their sin, their rejection, and we can see that, all right, Typically, depending on your theology, the Church shows up when about thirty three a D. Right, And now the Church is running its course, right, And the Church and most cases, act very similar to Israel, very similar. Right, we say the right words, we may use the right words, We do a lot of the same things, but some of the same rebellion and the same sin is present. So then the issue is if we are following a very similar path and we conmit the very same sin, and even these verses, right, we reject knowledge, we hewn out our own sisters, what we do the very similar things. Then the issue is what

42:15 is the problem and what is the solution? Now, what is the problem? We're all so we can maintain this. The problem is internal sin, and what can we be dogmatic about that God has not removed that internal sin. Now you see where why this is a problem in churches. The church can never address the problem because the church is almost inevitably unwilling to acknowledge that as Christians we are still what. They will say it, sometimes they'll pay lip service to it. And this is where the church gets very confused, because while the church may say we're still sinners, what do they continue to preach over and over and over and over. You can go to every church in ably and ask them this question, and they will all give an affirmative answer that when you become a Christian, what happened to you? Practically you become a new creature. All things have passed away, all things have become new. So then the inevitable idea is what Christians should no longer sin? Well, that's completely fraugile. And because if we're new creatures and the oldest gone and everything is new, all of our problems in the church should be over So we know that the problem is that when that passage says anyone who's and Christ is a new creature, that's reference to our positional standing before God, not our practical reality. My position is because of imputed righteousness,

43:46 I'm perfect holy, practically I'm not, but the Church has a hard time recognizing that or dealing with that. As a result, we can never fix the problem. So what is the cause of the problem in Israel and in the Church sin? What is the solution? Okay, now the Diane just said, I think on one hand, the solution first is we are saved positionally by imputed righteousness. That doesn't fix the practical problem. But the ultimate solution is not this glorification. What's going to be the ultimate solution for Israel when all Israel is saved? And then we talked about the millennial kingdom right, So like we're on very parallel paths. So let's see what they offer as the cause of the problem and the solution. Are you ready?

44:40 When we look at Jeremiah and Hoseah together, we see that the people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge because they are determining for themselves who God is and how he is to be served. Now, stop right there, Guess what that sounds like. They're going to say the problem the solution is, they're going to say, the solution is, we just need people to have the right knowledge, and then if we get the right knowledge, then we fix all of our problems. That that sounds good, right. I would have been very committed to that early in my Christian life, like, hey, if we just teach everyone the right way, then everything will be fine. But that doesn't work that way, does it after twenty five year? I took me twenty five years to figure it out. But now I've kind of figured it out, right, Okay, So let's see if they offer a solution that seems to be where they're going. Maybe maybe they're gonna pivot here It says, guess who God holds responsible for the sorry state of affairs? Now, this is how something I would have said, who do you think the article is going to blame? Now, we're not gonna blame it is Relkay, They're gonna blame pastors, which is what I would have done. Right.

45:51 Remember I used to always blame the church, the church, the church, the church, the church, the church. Right, So here we go the priest. That's who that they level because he's quoting Old Testament scriptures. Right, he holds them responsible for the people, for the people not knowing or adhering to his laws. Whoa wait a minute, So it's the priest's fault for people not knowing nor adhering to the laws. Now go back to that Hoseah passage. They wanted us to read Hoseah for six. Right, does the next verse explain why they have a lack of knowledge?

46:31 Or am I wrong? I'm just going from memory? Say that again? Well, look at verse six the first part. My people are destroyed for a lack of next verse or next or next part because you have rejected did knowledge? Now, wait a minute, is it my fault this someone rejects knowledge?

47:11 Right now? See, you gotta be careful here, right. You can't hold the priests responsible if the people reject knowledge. All you can do is teach him the knowledge. I can make you accept it. I mean, are we on the same path? I mean, if you're a parent, can't you can tell your kids things you can't do? What make them? What's the old saying? You can lead a horse to water, can't make him drink, right? I don't know if you can or can't. I don't know the facts the facts of that, but I know it sounds good, right. I can only teach so much? You can't as a pastor.

47:57 Not only can you only teach so much? What can you not do? You can't even make people show up? Okay, you're right there, right, There's been countless times in church and you're like, oh, I'm gonna cover this, I'm gonna cover this, and then six months later some people will say, well, what about this and what about that? I'm like, I just spent six months studying that. Do you not pay any attention to what we do here? Right? I mean? And for us for twenty something years, everything we teach is on the internet, usually within a thirty minutes after the message, Okay, and not only that, five six hours of broadcasting almost a day. Like I mean, I'm I mean we I mean we're are this church in the middle of nowhere. We're in the top five percent of all podcasts on the internet. Okay, that's I mean that.

48:46 I mean that that means what our content is where available? Right, I mean we're everywhere. We're on serious XM satellite radio for crying out loud. Okay, we're everywhere. Okay, So that means the content it has always been available. But what can I not do? I can't go Bobby, Diane, what are you doing in there? Listen to the podcast? I mean, I guess I could Bobby probably pull out a gun if they get off my yard, right, okay, right, okay, So the point that I can't do anything, So I don't know if I want to put the blame on the priest here, because it doesn't say they didn't have knowledge available? What does it say? Let everyone look at that verse again. They rejected it. Now why do we reject knowledge? Okay, now we're going back to the real problem.

49:42 Where's the real problem again? The sin nature? What does sin nature do? Sin nature cares about one thing? What self? Right? What does the sin nature love self? What does it care about self? What does it exalt self? What does it want self? So in many cases it's our sin nature that does what rejects? So I want everyone look at that verse again. I want to make sure you just write this verse down. Okay, my people, that's Israel's.

50:22 But if we're gonna connect it to the church, are destroyed for a lack of knowledge and when I and look, I was taught this in Bible college, taught it everywhere. And guess what my idea was, Well, I'm going to be the one to fix this. I'm gonna have a church, and all we're gonna do is teach, teach, teach. I'm gonna teach them church history. I'm gonna go all the way back to the seven Ecumenical Council. And did I not do all of this? I'm gonna teach, teach. We're gonna do systematic theology. We're gonna do historical theology. We're gonna do biblical theology. We're gonna talk Hebrew, We're gonna talk Greek. We're gonna talk about exegeating scripture. We're gonna go on and on. We're gonna study, study, study, study, study, study, study, study, study, study, study, study.

51:04 I'm gonna fix it. What did I stupid? What did I not do? Read the next line? Okay, what does the next line say? Yeah? I didn't. No one can fix that for me. Right, Because you have rejected knowledge, I will also reject you from being priest for me because you have forgotten the law of your God. Now please note I'm gonna reject you from being priest for me, now, is that referring specifically to the priest or to Israel itself? Or if it's referring to the priest, then this issue is not the people. This issue is whom the priest. The priest have rejected the knowledge. So this is not even going after the peace. So if you're gonna use this verse, you gotta be careful. But in my brain, oh, I was gonna fix it. But what could I not account for? You can't make people listen, you can't make people take notes, You can't make people do anything right.

52:02 We can spend money on books, we can hand out devotionals. Guess what I can't make people do, use them, read them. Nobody prepared me for this. They prepared me for the first part. But in reality, health should this be applied If you are going to be quote unquote priest or a pastor, your job is to know the knowledge and not reject the knowledge. This seems more directed towards the spiritual leaders, does it not? Now? Go back to what they said here? All right, here we go. It says, when we look at Jeremy and jose together, we see that the people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge because they are determining for themselves who God is and how he is to be served. Guess who God holds responsible for this sorry state of affairs. The priest. He holds them responsible for the people not knowing or adhering to his loss. So the first problem is we blame the praiest for the people not knowing. But that's not what this is about. This is about people rejecting. So that's already the point. But second, okay, and oh, I know this is going to get this is going to get me in trouble. But I think we have to deal with this. When the Protestant Reformation occurred, there was a major shift that happened, right, But prior to the Protestant Reformation October thirty first, what year? Okay, I don't know. Okay, y'all need to look that up. Okay, fifteen seventeen, all right,

53:33 look at that, Bobby, all right, good time, all right, So fifteen seventeen, October thirty first, fifteen seventeen, before that monumental, I mean, one of the most important dates in history. Before that happens, How does it work? The people have to rely on whom the church. It's called magisterial authority right within Catholicism, right, they have apostolic succession. They have the authority who declares dogma church, who says, if you don't follow the dogma, you were anathema the church. And so do you have the ability to read and interpret the Bible? No, who gives you the interpretation? The church?

54:15 Everything is church, church, church, church Church. Luther decided disagree with the church. You're wrong. And you can understand why he was having problems with the church. The church was so corrupt at the time, it wasn't even funny, right, So Luther's like, no, it's not the church, it's the it's the scriptures. And then remember there was a big theological issue at this time, referred to as the priesthood of the believer. Oh, now this gets controversial, right, because now the idea is that you, everyone in the congregation, you are a priest, and you have the power and the authority to not only read the scriptures and to understand the scriptures, but you also have the power and the authority to do what to determine if what's being preached is true or false, putting you in what position the authority. Right, this is the inevitable cause. Remember with forevery action there's always unintended consequences, right, And so Luther thought, I'm going to restore the authority to the Bible. But in reality he restored the authority back from He took the authority from the church and gave it to the individual. Now, once the individual has that authority, you don't come to me and tell me it's the pastor's fault that people don't have knowledge. Guess whose fault it is. It's the

55:46 people's fault. It's on them. Don't blame the pastor, especially in twenty twenty four, because every person in the world, but for the most part, other than maybe countries were so and things are banned, but almost across the popular the planet, every individual can have what a Bible, and probably not just one. They can probably have all of them on their phone, and they can have access to what Greek, Hebrew, that have access to commentary after commentary, they have the entire access to all the writings of the church fathers on their phone, for crying out loud.

56:28 So don't sit there and say, well, the reason these statistics are so bad is because pastors aren't doing their job. It's not because pastors aren't doing their job. It's because the people in the pew don't stinking care to actually read and study anything. That's their fault. Stop blaming the church. I used to blame the church, but when you study church history, you're like, come on, now, this is on the people. Because you know why I decided to get tired of blaming the church, because I've been a pastor long enough to know what happens. As soon as I preached something that someone disagree with, they do what you're wrong. You're wrong, And I'm gonna live this church. I'm gonna go to a church that says the things I want to hear. Well, then if you're the authority, don't blame me for your lack of knowledge. It's whose fault. So don't blame the priest here. Now, in that context of the Old Testament, you could blame the priest because what did the people not have. They didn't have scripture, they had to rely on the priest. But in our day and age, you can't blame the church for that. That's insane.

57:42 That's the people's fault. Now. The people don't like hearing that, right, The people in the pugue. Whenever I throw when I throw it back on the people, they get mad. And so then guess how I started handling disputes. Don't come to me and tell me I'm wrong, do what? Go study and bring me the proof that you see studied. And guess did anyone ever come back and do that? No, not one person has ever come back and said, here, here's here's all my note books, here's all my notebooks, here's all the work I've done. And almost in every case I say, if there's gonna be a distribute, I tell everyone what to look up. Right, nobody comes out here? You go. I looked up every use of the word Israel, or I looked up every use here. I looked up this No, because that would require what lots of work?

58:25 But they still But did that change the arguing No, still told me I'm wrong and still left. That means you have authority without even studying. So then you can then turn around to blame made for lack of knowledge. You see. So I agree with this article to a part, But this part I'm gonna, I'm gonna. I'm very much in disagreement with right. So let's read that again. All right, and we're oh, well, we're gonna we're out of time, right, We're not even gonna get through this. But that's okay, all right. So he says, guess who God holds responsible for the sorry state of affairs? The priest. He holds them responsible for the people not knowing or adhering to His laws. So we dealt with the not knowing part, the not adhering to the law part. This makes me want to throw my iPad and smash into a million pieces.

59:10 All right, this is this drives me crazy. All right? Why do people not adhere to the law? Is it because of the pastor or because of the priest? And make it clear no one, no one can keep God's laws. That's one of the most like when you study theology, you're studying the Bible. That's one of the most mind blowing things about the Bible is the Bible provides a system of morality that the people who wrote it could not even keep. That's a good argument for the scriptures being inspired by God, because if I was writing it, I would write rules that I could do. What keep?

1:00:00 I can write rules that I can't keep. That's that's the dumbest thing in the history of humankind. Right, Hey, I'm gonna write a book of rules, and that I can't keep. That puts me making that inevitably I'm gonna be called a hypocrite. And when you read about the people in the Bible, what do you almost inevitably want to call them? Right? David who wrote the Psalms adultery. Then she got pregnant, so then he's like, oh, I gotta cover this up to try to get him drunk so that he would be with his wife. Didn't work, so then he had him killed. Then he lies to some priests. They all get slaughtered, and all the people, and we go all the things David did, Abram and we can go on and Solomon, I mean, Solomon was just going like, I'm gonna break every rule under the sun. Right, A thousand women, a thousand that the seven hundred wives, three hundred concubines, right, so about a thousand total. That's insane.

1:01:00 I mean, we go on and on and on and on and out. Why were they not keeping the law. Let me make it very clear, no one can. I can give you three laws that can immediately demonstrate to you you can't keep it. You ready? Number one love God with all your heart, mind, body, and soul. I'm done love my neighbor as myself. I'm not going to love anybody like I love myself. Number three, be ye holy as God as holy? If I could be as holy as God is holy, that's insane. That would be absolute perfection. And for Jesus to make it very clear, the Sermon on the Mount, where's the gospels begin with? What does he saying the Sermon on the Mount? Be Ye perfect? I can't do it. So if nobody can keep the law, I can't blame. He's blaming the priest for people not keeping the law. Guess what? We nobody can keep the law because we have a sinful nature, So nobody can keep it. So what is the law designed for? To show us that we can't keep it?

1:02:09 So that we feel guilt, so that we go to what someone who kept it for us? And that's why we are say by in imputed righteousness, because the obedience of Christ is imputed to my account. So I stand before God, and when I stand before God, I am seen to be perfect, holy, and obedient, even though I cannot and will never keep it. So can anyone ever keep the law? No? So is that the priest's fault. No, that's the inevitable state of our sinful nature. Now, if you wanted to blame someone, who could you blame? You could blame God, because God can remove our sin nature.

1:02:50 But he doesn't. Because the entire concept of Christianity is that we are say, by grace alone, through faith alone, because of Christ alone, and that we do not save ourselves. He has to save us, not only by paying for our sins, but then giving us the righteousness which he kept. He obeyed the law, and then that's accredited to me. Now, some people said, well, that's gonna be kind of a messed up church, right, you gotta have people who declare to be perfect to or what not perfect, that's gonna be a really messed up church. And you're like ding ding ding ding exactly. And that's what we've had for two thousand years, and that's what we had in Israel.

1:03:36 So I agree with him of the problem, but I'm disagreeing with him on who to blame. Can't blame the priest when we talk about the priesthood of all believers, and it's the believers who judges the church. Can't blame the priest. And you can't blame the priest for people not obeying the law, because even the priest quote unquote can't obey the law. Do pastors. Do pastors obey all the scripture? No? Christians? No, So we're all on the same boat. So in really in an article trying to design to fix the problem is actually doing what perpetuating the exact same problem. Right, And so I'll finish with this, he goes on. So he blames the priest, and then he goes on to say this instead of affirming the law, they yielded to the will of the people. Well, there is some case where pastors do yield to the will of the people. That goes back to the original problem we discuss. But at the same time, it's not the will of the people that's the problem. It's our own will and our own sinful nature that causes the problems. Right, So it says those of us who stand in the pulpit have the same responsibility and accountability to God as the priest. We are to teach the fullness of Scripture.

1:04:52 We are the unvarnished truth that most of society condemns and rejects. I think we are to teach the unvarnished truth many in the church will reject. He forgets that again. He wants to put the blame outside and sadly, we have people in our congregations who agree with society. Well, we've always had people in the congregation who agrees with society, because sometimes the people in the pulpit agree with society because we are all sinners. He continues to overlook the problem. When we speak the truth, we are loving our people in the same way that Jesus loved the religious leaders. Yes, for some the truth will sting and be uncomfortable, and that's a good thing. We're in good company for Jesus. A person. For Jesus, a person avoiding an eternity in the liquifire was infinitely more important than hurt feelings. All right, So we'll stop there. They do acknowledge that there's not easy questions or easy answers here. But his inevitable thing is the problem is Christians don't have knowledge. Christians don't obey the law. And whose fault is it? It's the pastor's fault. And I say, within the Protestant system, that's ridiculous.

1:06:00 Number one, because you are supposed to be quote unquote priest right, and you are the one actually judging what is preached. So if you can judge what is preached, how's that my fault. I'm supposed to give you the knowledge that you can turn around and then judge me by said knowledge. It would be like, no, you're if you're judging me, then you've got to have your own knowledge to be able to judge me. Right, Like the whole thing just doesn't work. And then secondly, you can't blame the preacher for you not keeping the law, because I think that's a misunderstanding of the law. God's law is not designed for us to keep. God's law is designed to show us our inability to keep it. So we run for a solution, and the solution is not try harder. The solution is find someone who will keep it for me, and that is Christ. Now does that mean then I just do whatever I want? No, we have to continue to struggle. But what do we know in that struggle it's not gonna I can point to your sin and say stop it. But I know I've got my own sin that I need to say stop it, right because we all have sin, So I do agree with him that there's a problem in the church. My issue is the problem in the church has always existed.

1:07:22 Our Christians today seem more theologically confused than maybe at any time in recent church history. I think maybe they're more philologically confused than they've ever been. And I know we want to blame the church for people's stological confusion, but reality, I'm going to put the blame where on the people if unless we're going to go back to Catholicism, and then the church has the authority. And then I say, this is what you believe in. You don't what you don't question or challenge or fight it. But nobody wants that because everybody wants to be their own pope. Well, if you want to be the own pope, what comes with that? The responsibility, the responsibility. So like, I don't know, that article doesn't necessarily fix the problem. I'll probably address it more in the podcast, but at least we can kind of kind of see that, yes, is there a problem in the church. We can all say yes, that problem ultimately is what sin? And what is the solution to the sin? Nature the finished work of Jesus Christ.

1:08:25 It's imputed to us by faith alone. That's the inevitable, And I said, well, how do you fix the other problems? The other problems are never going to ever truly be fixed. All we can do is try to work it so that we can try to make better changes. But it's never going to be perfect. It's never going to be perfect. So that doesn't really end on a hopeful note. But there we go. All right. I know that wasn't what was planned today, so that was kind of an impromptu but hopefully it was somewhat beneficial. Right, let's pray, Lord, got we come before you. Lord, we acknowledge one thing today and one thing alone, that we are sinners, that we fail in our own responsibility. And Lord, we thinkful that you sit your son to die and to keep the law for us, so that we have hope, faith and salvation in him alone. And it's in his name we pray. And God's people said