In the Word

Pastor Mike Warren: Thank you tonight for your word. Ezekiel to me is one of those very special prophets for a number of reasons. A priest that was refitted as it were when he found himself there in Babylon to become a prophet. Lord, we thank you for just how candid you have been sharing your heart with this prophet so he could share it to us. So speak to our hearts tonight we would pray in the mighty name of Jesus we would ask. And all God's kids would say: Amen.

Let me just remind you again why Ezekiel of all of the Old Testament prophets is special. Every one of them is special because they have a special message and there are things that I have learned and that I have applied to my life as I studied those Old Testament prophets so we don't fail in a New Testament. Ezekiel to me is probably my favorite because as it were God exposes himself.

There is a transparency about God, his heart, his desire, his feelings. We are created in the image of God. How many have feelings? Feelings. We all have them. I think sometimes we think that God the Father doesn't have them. Do you know that we are capable as we've been studying through this section in Chapter 16 of breaking his heart? We are capable of grieving the Holy Spirit.

So when we think in terms of that, we look at sin a little bit differently, don't we? Because I think for the most part the modern church thinks of sin and the consequences of sin as how they affect us. We never think in terms that our behavior has an effect on our Father. Does he not relate to us in terms of relationship? It's not a religion. God the Father, God the Son, Holy Spirit no doubt being the mom, doing all the correcting and disciplining.

We are called the bride of Christ. Israel in the Old Testament, the wife of God. It is all relational. As we come into the body of Christ, we are called brothers and sisters, the children of God. So the whole Bible is written in terms of intimacy, of relationship. How many have ever been hurt in a relationship? The person that hurt you is the person that you love, you invited them into your life. God loves us with an everlasting love.

The thing I love about Ezekiel, God becomes very transparent. He says things like: Do you think it is a small matter that you would commit whoredom against me? That you would give your love and your relationship to every person that passes by? Idolatry is just that to him. It is a form of spiritual adultery and it breaks the heart of the Father. All the way through Chapter 16 he has been telling us this. In fact, Spurgeon said that Chapter 16 is a chapter he would never teach in public because of the analogies that God uses in relation to his people and how it hurts him when we sin against him.

As we said starting back in Chapter 12 all the way through Chapter 24, this section of Ezekiel, God is giving us reasons as though he needed to do that. But he is giving us reasons for why he is disciplining his people. He is a reasonable God. In Isaiah Chapter 1, he says: Come let us reason together saith the Lord, though your sins be as scarlet, I can make them as white as snow, though they be as crimson. You know the scene.

So he is going to lay it out so that when he is done disciplining his people, nobody can accuse him of doing something that was wrong. And we are still in that section. Let's finish out Chapter 16 this evening and then we will move into Chapter 17 and see if we can't get that done and then we can move on to some other things. Back in Verse 49 as we ended last week, he said: Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom.

In this he is going to tell us that Sodom, Gomorrah, Samaria—Samaria had been led into captivity, the northern ten tribes, 130 years earlier by the Assyrians—but he is going to say things like: your sin was greater than Sodom, greater than Gomorrah, greater than Samaria because you sinned in light and you saw the consequences of their behavior and you did it anyway.

You are not sinning in ignorance. I have told you before, for me because I have taught through the Bible so many times, I have been a believer for 46 years, that I can no longer claim sin. For me, it is transgression because at this point in my life, I should know better. As we mature in Christ, sometimes we should just know better. But I thank God that back in Leviticus he makes a provision not only for sin but for transgression as well, your sins and your iniquities, what twists you. God said he could forgive. But he is going to say the three things, and notice tonight as we go through this that these are categories.

I have read to ad nauseam commentators who say: well, then God didn't think much of sexual sin and much of this if these are the three things. These are categories and we will see that. Just like in 1 John Chapter 2, John warns us: Love not the world nor the things that are in the world because all that is in the world is the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life. Those are categories. If you fall into sin as a believer, it'll be in a sexual sin, or it'll be materialism—you get caught up in this world—or it'll be pride so you can't be corrected or taught. Those are categories.

Every sin that we ever commit against God our Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, every time we wound and grieve the Holy Spirit, it will fall in the New Testament in one of those three categories. But as we come to the Old Testament, it will be in one of these three categories. Listen to what he says in Verse 49. Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom: pride. Circle that, make note of that. Pride. Now he mentions pride here first. Pride. Pride is an awful thing. Pride is the thing that got us in the mess we are in. Did you know that?

You read in Isaiah Chapter 14 that Satan some place at some point in his existence—because he was created, in fact the word for Lucifer means shining one—there was something special about him. In fact, Ezekiel is going to tell us as we walk our way through, I think when we come to the 16th chapter... I can't remember which chapter it is now, faded from my memory, bummer getting old. But he is going to tell us in Ezekiel that all the instruments of worship were created in Ezekiel. He was the worship leader. He was on stage. People looked to him. And some way, somehow we are not sure, we will have to ask the Lord when we get there, pride entered his heart.

And he said: I will lift my throne above the throne of the Most High, I will become as God. Romans Chapter 1 tells us the same thing. When they knew me and knew all there was to know about me, their foolish hearts became darkened and they changed as it were the glory of the true and living God to things. And then God says he gave them over, but he said they committed the sin, and that's the sin of pride. Because pride is the opposite of humility and contriteness. Pride is the opposite of having a teachable and meek spirit.

So when God wants to speak to us, if there is pride we ignore what he is saying and we think we are wiser than God and we go about our own business to our own destruction. There's a way the Bible says that seems right unto a man but the end of it is destruction, and it all begins with pride. So he says of the three categories of your sister Sodom, the first was pride. The second was fullness of bread. You were full and filled and satisfied with carnal things. I think that's the problem with the church today with so many people who profess to be Christians. They are full and filled and satisfied with the things of this world.

They are so full and satisfied, they have so settled down and made themselves at home in this world materialistically speaking that that's where they get their joy, that's where they get their sense of self-worth from. Everything that they should get from the Lord, they get from the world because they are satisfied. They have full bellies with carnal things and they're not concerned about spiritual things. I guarantee you the attitude of every Christian one nanosecond after the rapture is going to change.

We are called to be heavenly minded. We are called to pursue spiritual things. We are called to seek ye first as we sang tonight, seek first the kingdom of heaven and everything else will be added unto us. Our spiritual concerns are to be the foremost in our life, not our physical concerns. Jesus will say things like: listen, aren't you more special than the sparrows? They don't have a house, they don't store things in barns, yet do I not take care of them? Why do you worry about the things of this life?

Again, he ends that whole section when he's talking about that by saying: seek first the kingdom and all of this other stuff, your Father knows that you need a place to live, he knows you need clothes on your back, he knows you need food, he even knows you need to buy gas to get to work. He said all of those things I will give you, but your priority ought to be spiritual things, not carnal. He says the second sin that caused them to fall away from the Lord into idolatry was fullness of bread, and then the third one was abundance of idleness, laziness, slothfulness, carelessness, a little folding of the hands as Proverbs says.

Because you are full and you are satisfied with spiritual things, there's a complacency, there's an idleness, there's a laziness and a slothfulness that can come into the life of the believer even in spiritual ways and not just in physical ways. So he says: listen, these three things—pride, fullness of bread, and abundance of idleness—was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and the needy. In all of this, it created selfishness, self-centeredness, self-seeking, not concerned about the people around you, only concerned about yourself, no concern for the poor and needy.

And they were haughty and committed abominations before me. Therefore I took them away as I saw good. Again, God is giving reasons. He's saying: because they were this way, because they were filled with pride and did not turn at my rebuke. We're going to see that in a few moments when we get into Chapter 17. Because Chapter 17 is very simple; it's got one truth that it wants to lay out. That the judgment that you are experiencing, you need to submit to that because you deserve it.

He's going to say as we're going to read from Jeremiah that Nebuchadnezzar was his servant to bring that discipline upon his people because you did not turn at my rebuke. You did not harken at my instruction. You did not listen at my conviction. I pray for us tonight: be careful, be ever so careful because the Holy Spirit is a still small voice. Many times he is speaking and he's trying to get our attention. He gets our attention when we read and study the Bible, he gets our attention when we're in that time of prayer, he gets our attention when we're asking for wisdom. He should be getting our attention all the time because he's there to lead us and to guide us into all truth. He's there to warn us and to convict us of sin, he's to keep us and protect us.

He is the Spirit of God that lives in us that will never leave us nor forsake us. And we need to learn to listen. Maybe even tonight God is saying something to you, has been saying something to you. We're very good as human beings at justifying our behavior. We're very good at deceiving ourselves. We're very good at reasoning in a way and making excuses for the things we're involved in instead of simply saying: Lord, you speak and I will obey.

Jesus asked a very pointed question in Luke's Gospel Chapter 6, Verse 46. It is one of those questions that when I'm alone with the Lord, I constantly hear it in my own heart, my own mind: Why do you call me Lord, Lord and do not the things that I say? Jesus said: my sheep, the sheep of my pasture, hear my voice and they listen and follow no other. It is the job of every believer to tune in. To tune into the voice of the Lord and then to tune out the other voices because the Bible says there's many voices gone out in the world and none of them without significance, and all of them are vying for our attention, are they not?

But there's only one voice of truth, there's only one voice of reason, there's only one voice that leads us and guides us in this spiritual thing. And that's the voice we need to be listening to. He said: because you did not listen to my voice, I took away these things from you. We're going to see as we move into Chapter 17, he sent Nebuchadnezzar there first in 605 BC and he conquered those people. God was going to use that and he set up a vassal king that rebelled. He had to come back again in 597 and this time he strips the temple of all of the items of worship and takes all of the priests, he takes Jehoiachin the princes and he leads them captivity. And they rebel again.

All the while Jeremiah is saying: you need to submit to this, this is God's punishment and discipline upon your behavior. Because you keep rebelling against what God is trying to teach you again in 586, they rebelled and this time when Nebuchadnezzar came, he leveled the city. It's a testimony to this day when you go to Israel. When you go to Israel, there's some parts over in the old part of the city that they're excavating and you can see in their excavation as they're moving down through the layers of soil that there's two huge black lines run right across the strata of the soil.

The first one was Nebuchadnezzar when he burned the city to the ground in 586 BC. Right below that, they found all of these idols. Thousands of idols excavated there. Because they wouldn't turn from their idolatry, God burned it as it were to the ground. The second line is after Jesus was crucified and they rebelled, and God said: I'm going to scatter you. Titus Vespasian, that great Roman general, came in to quell an uprising in Jerusalem and they sacked the temple and they burned it to the ground. And those two lines stand as a testimony that God is going to do what he said he is going to do.

May there be no black lines. There's enough black lines in my life because there's times when I have not listened. It breaks my heart now that I am maturing more in the Lord to know that there are times in my life I didn't listen. Let's just be real honest tonight. This is like a big counseling session. How many have had those times in your life where you didn't listen and God burned it down? Amen? And you've got those black lines, a couple of them. Hope there's no more than that. It is a testimony. But the true testimony as we get to the end of this chapter is that God builds again.

After we learn the lesson, God builds again. One of the greatest verses of the Old Testament for me is when Samson wouldn't listen. He was a judge, anointed of the Lord to speak to God's people. And he didn't listen and he got involved in the things he shouldn't get involved in and he gave away his secret and they put his eyes out and they tied him as it were to the millwright where they were milling the grain and they came and mocked him. The great Samson, the great judge of Israel. But the greatest words in the Bible are: and his hair began to grow again. And he killed more Philistines in his death than he did in his life.

God always builds again. But listen, why tear it down in the first place? May God just be remodeling our lives, not have to burn it to the ground and start over. So he is saying here: I took it away. Neither hath Samaria committed half thy sin. What he is saying is: you saw 130 years earlier as I judged those ten northern tribes, I brought the Assyrians in and I judged them for their sin as they built that calf up in Dan. You saw that and you continued to sin. They haven't sinned half what you have sinned, but thou hast multiplied thine abominations more than they, and hast justified thy sister in all the abominations which thou hast done.

You are so bad in what you've done it was almost like they were just. I was thinking the other day and I hate to even bring this up, but this world's gotten weird. I grew up in the "Leave It to Beaver" time with the Cleaver family. Beaver got in trouble, Wally didn't help much, Ward would correct the kids and the mom would support it, and there was a moral lesson to it. But I look around today and I see the insanity of the sin of this world. I actually count myself to be lucky when somebody just comes in my office for counseling and it's just good red-blooded American sin. It's not like: I'm confused at what sex I am. I mean, it's gone to a point where you're just saying: what is going on? The abominations have increased. This nation is confused, have you noticed?

So he is saying here that you are worse than they. Now listen to what he says in Verse 52. This is a good warning for us tonight as Christians. Thou also, which hast judged thy sister... Doesn't other people's sin always look worse? Doesn't our sin always look worse when other people are doing it? I wrote something today on Facebook and it came out of this verse. That if you knew, if you understood, if you ever come to the realization, if God ever show you or reveal to you by divine inspiration what you look like to him on your best day...

...on your best day, you would fall on your face for the rest of your life and thank him every day that he saved you. Because his eyes are too pure to look upon sin. Somehow we fall into this system where I go to church once a week, and shame on the guy who only goes twice a month, or I pay 10 percent in my tithe, and who's this guy over here paying five? We get this religious attitude where we start judging other people as though we're measuring them by us. Can I give you some advice tonight? If you want to judge, you want to measure, you want to condemn, you want in some ways think that you are superior, would you do me a favor? Would you measure yourself to Christ and see how you measure up? You're saved by grace.

I'm saved by grace. We're not consumed because God is merciful. Every day we ought to fall on our face and thank him for that. Amen? They were judging Samaria, they were judging Sodom there in Jerusalem. Thou also hast judged thy sister, bear thine own shame for thy sins that thou hast committed more abominable than they. They are more righteous than you. Yea, be confounded also and bear thy shame in that thou hast justified thy sister. You have been so bad you've justified your sister. Your sins are so much worse and yet you thought to judge them.

I really have a hard time with religious people because I know that religious people have no understanding of the grace of God because if they did, they wouldn't be religious. And what I mean by religious is self-righteous, thinking they've earned somehow through their efforts some standing or position, or they've garnered by their efforts the love of God. Listen, God loves us because he is loving. We are sinners to the core. We are conceived in sin, born in transgression. We come into this world fallen, we come in this world separated from God. And the only thing that brought us back to him was the work of Jesus Christ on Calvary's cross.

The only thing we brought to that, not even the faith because he gave us the faith to believe, the only thing we brought to that is he got us so broken that we just had to look up to see down and we came to the cross and we were born again. He wrote our names. We're going to see at the end of this when God finally says that I'm going to restore you, it's all about him and not about us. You are what you are tonight sitting here because Jesus did that for you. We just come to the cross with nothing in our hands. Nothing in my hands I bring, simply to the cross of Christ I have to cling. We are a product of his grace. We live because he's merciful. We know him because he reveals himself to us because we couldn't know any other way.

Through all of that, he loves us. And if he's been gracious to you and he's been gracious to me, why would you ever point a finger at anybody else? You couldn't, you can't, you won't. That's why Jesus had to say things like: get the log out of your own eye before you can see clear to help somebody get the speck out of their own. So we have to be careful because that's what they were doing. Not only were they caught up in this pride and fullness of bread and abundance of idleness, they actually thought that they had the right to judge other people. And here he's saying: listen, you don't have the right. Now watch as we go through the next several verses. Very important point I want to make.

What he is saying is: I don't care how far you have fallen. This is what's going to be said in the next number of verses. I don't care how far you have fallen, God is able to redeem and to restore. All you have to do is turn. Metanoeō: repent, turn. You see, God is not interested in your sin, he's interested in your repentance. He is not interested in continuing to correct you, he is interested in your restoration. Everything he does is to get to that point. Everything we've read in Chapter 16 is to get to Verses 59 and 60 on through 63. This is the point he's trying to make.

When I shall bring them again the captivity of Sodom and her daughters... What is God saying? One day I will restore them. We don't have any point in history that we can point to, there's no scripture that I can address that says that's ever happened. I think he's spiritually speaking. I think he's using allegory here. I think he's saying: listen, Sodom and Gomorrah and their wickedness was not beyond my redemption. Think about that for a moment. I've had people come after the service to come up for prayer and say: I really want to receive Christ as my Savior, but I've gone too far.

And I say: no, you haven't. And they'll say: well, you don't know what I've done. I say: it doesn't matter. You could be an axe murderer and you could have ducked in the building and the police could be waiting for you there. You may go to jail and they may put this body to death, but you can be redeemed. You can be born again. You can have eternal life. Your sins can be forgiven. It doesn't matter. You see, God doesn't so much care about what you have done or who you did it to. He's not so much concerned about what you've guzzled down your throat, snorted up your nose, injected in your arms, or inhaled into your lungs. He doesn't care where you slept or who you slept with because he knows that you came into this world fallen. He gets that.

But what he is concerned about is that as the Spirit of God speaks to your heart and deals with your heart, that you would fall on your face and say: Father, forgive me a sinner. Would you wash me? Would you cleanse me? Would you bring me back into fellowship? That's what he is after. Because he says by one sacrifice I have perfected forever. Read it in Hebrews Chapter 10, Verse 14. I've perfected forever those whom I have declared to be holy. And then you move down to Verse 17, he says: after you come to salvation, born of the spirit, he said your sins and your iniquities I will remember no more.

All God wants is brokenness and contriteness. He says it at the end of Isaiah: to this man will I look, to this woman will get my attention, to the one who is of a broken and contrite spirit who trembles at my word. He knows you're a mess, the problem is you just don't know it yet. He'll help you to discover it until you no longer trust in yourself, you trust in him. So he says: listen, I want you to understand something. Sodom and Samaria weren't beyond my redemption. Verse 54: That thou mayest bear thine own shame and mayest be confounded in that thou hast done, in that thou art comforted unto them. If I can restore them, do you think I can't restore you?

When your sisters, Sodom and her daughters, shall return to their former estate... When I'm done disciplining them, they're going to come back. And Samaria, her daughters, shall return to their former estate. Then art thou, thou daughters, shall return to your former estate. For thy sister Sodom was not mentioned by thy mouth in the day of thy pride. You thought yourself to be so superior to Sodom and Samaria, you wouldn't even let those words come off your lip. Even in the days of Jesus, they would go around Samaria. And if they had to go through Samaria because they had a business dealing going on, the devout Jews once they got on the borders of Samaria, they'd take their shoes off and knock the dust out lest anything from Samaria would be tracked back home.

And Jesus said: I must needs go through Samaria. It freaked the disciples out. What do you mean we need to go through Samaria? Because Jesus knew there was a lady waiting at a well. Who had had five husbands and the one she was with she wasn't even married to. There was a divine appointment. He sends his disciples away because he didn't want that judgmental spirit to be there. He sends them away and he has a conversation with the woman of Samaria. And he says to her: can you give me a drink? And in her pride and arrogance: well, this is a fine thing, you being a Jew asking me, a Samaritan woman, to give you a drink.

And then he said: if you knew the water I have and the water I'm willing to freely give, you would ask me. She goes: you don't even have anything to fetch the water, what do you mean you have water? Torrents of it, as a matter of fact. And then he says to her: well, go get your husband. I don't have one. Well have you said. You think God can't read our mail? You think you hide anything from him? He said you've had five, and the one you're with is not yours. Then she wants to get religious. Not right, religious. Well, we Samaritans believe that we should worship in Mount Gerizim and you say Jerusalem, which is the right place?

And Jesus said: listen, the day is coming and now is when the true worshiper will worship in spirit and in truth. It has nothing to do with a place. But you, what about you? And I believe in that interaction she gets saved and she runs back into the town and says: come see a man, told me everything I've ever done. And I think all Samaria is primed and saved so that when Philip goes down there, revival takes place. So we do have an example in the New Testament, not of Sodom but of Samaria, certainly getting saved. And so he says: but you wouldn't even speak of her because you thought you were so much more superior to her, but look what I've done for Samaria.

Well in fact you remember when they couldn't find a place to stay, John wants to smoke them, wants to call fire down from heaven. How many have ever wanted to smoke somebody? Just call fire down from heaven and smoke that person, Lord get him. Be careful because he should have got you. Amen? But you know, the funny thing is John did get to call fire down from heaven on Samaria, but it was the fire of the Holy Spirit. So he says: listen, you judged them when you shouldn't have. Verse 57: Before thy wickedness was discovered, as at the time of thy reproach of the daughters of Syria and all round about her, the daughters of the Philistines, which despise thee round about, thou hast borne thy lewdness and thine abomination saith the Lord.

For thus says the Lord God: listen carefully, I will even deal with thee as thou hast done, which thou despised the oath in breaking the covenant. Again, he's reminding them: this is why I'm disciplining you. You broke the covenant, you despised my relationship with you. You went off and played the harlot and the whore, you took in all of the lovers and you forsook me. In fact, as earlier in Chapter 16 he says: all of the things I gave you, when I found you, when I passed by and I saw you dying in your own blood, I said to you: live, live. I'm the one who picked you up and rubbed you with salt and cleansed you. I'm the one who clothed you and bedecked you with gold and jewels. I'm the one who gave you everything you have and you spent it as it were on your lovers.

Then he says: listen, this is why I'm disciplining you. But now, Verse 60. We spent three weeks trying to get to Verse 60. Verse 60! This is the second "but God". You remember the first "but" is all of these things he did for them, but you went and played the harlot. And so God brought the discipline. Now we get to the second "but God" here. My favorite saying in the New Testament: but God. First time I read it: but God, who is rich in his mercy and his great love where he loved you even when you were dead in your trespasses and sins, died for you.

I remember when I first got saved and I read that verse, I went down to DMV because I wanted to get the license plate that said: BUT GOD. Because for me that was everything: but God. I was a mess, but God. I was on my way to hell, but God. I was a drug addict, amoral, messed up, on my way to commit suicide, but God. I said: that's it, I'm going to put BUT GOD on my license plate so people ask me "but God", I could tell them why "but God". He changed everything in a nanosecond of my life, but God. Then I could witness. I found it was already taken, bummed out because there's nothing else that represented... What are you going to do?

I mean, BUT GOD. And so one day I'm up visiting... I've gone through Bible college, I'm in the ministry, I've got a pastor friend that lives up in Paradise. I went up there to visit him and he says: man, I want you to come out and take a look at my new Harley. I just got it back from the paint shop and just been restored. And I walk out there and guess what the license plate on that Harley said: BUT GOD. I said: brother, if you were a true man of God, you would give me that license plate. He looked at me and said: brother, if you were a true man of God, you wouldn't ask. And so I never got the license plate.

But I'll tell you this: but God changes everything. Watch what he says here: nevertheless—which means "but"—nevertheless, watch the "I will"s here. There are three of them and then there is a description of the completeness of what he will do. Listen to me tonight, listen carefully: all God wants is repentance. He is after a broken and contrite spirit. He wants your heart to break for the things you've done that have broken his heart because he will heal your heart and his in the process.

He says this: nevertheless, I will remember my covenant with you in the days of your youth, when I made it with you. Even though you forgot it and you've transgressed it and you've violated it and you broke it, I will remember my covenant that I made with you when you were young, when I found you as a youth dying in your blood. Watch the second "I will": and I will establish unto thee an everlasting covenant. I'm going to make it. I just saw some stupid thing someone posted about: well, if eternal security was real then Satan would be okay. God didn't come to redeem fallen angels; he came to redeem you and me. We are the jewel of his crown.

The whole reason the rabbis of old said the reason that Satan tempted mankind is because he was jealous of us because we had a special place in the heart of God. God never sent his Son to redeem angels. You blow it, you're in the lake of fire, you're going to be consumed forever in chains of darkness. But he came to redeem us. And there is a covenant relationship we can enter into. When we're unfaithful, he remains faithful. If you have been born of the Spirit, if you have been born again, if you have been washed in the blood of Jesus Christ, you may wander, but I'm going to tell you, your britches are going to be put on fire.

God will apply wisdom to the seat of understanding and you will make it back. I've had people say: well, that guy came up and prayed to receive the Lord a couple Sundays ago and now it's been several months and we don't see him anymore. I saw him up at the bar. I said: if he was truly born again, don't worry about him. Worry about you. What do you mean don't worry about him? He'll be back. You see, God is the original "I'll be back". Because you will be back. Because he finishes what he starts.

And he is saying to this idolatrous wife of his, Israel: listen, I will remember my covenant with thee in the days of thy youth and I will establish... I'm going to do it. You can come one way or another, but you're coming. Dragging, screaming and kicking or willingly. I will establish unto thee an everlasting covenant. Now watch Verse 61: then shalt thy remember thy ways. Here's what he's looking for, listen carefully: the whole purpose of correction is for this moment. God said: I'm going to be faithful, I'm going to establish it. Then you, I, us, we shall remember our ways and be ashamed when thou shalt receive thy sister, thy elder and thy younger. When we see how God has rescued and redeemed what we thought was the worst, then we're going to be broken and repentant.

And we'll remember. We're going through Philippians on Sunday mornings and in Philippians it's interesting because there's things he's going to tell us that we need to remember and there's things we do need to remember. But then he's going to tell us there's things we need to forget—forgetting those things that are behind because Satan can use them against us. And then he's going to tell us to think on certain things that have virtue. I'm telling you tonight, if you're repentant, you need to forget those things that are behind so that Satan can't use them against you because they're under the blood. And Satan can't pull them out from under the blood. Jesus won't; he'll defend you. You shouldn't. And if your enemies do, they're in trouble. Amen?

Because this is what God said he's going to do. He said you're going to remember, you're going to repent, you're going to be broken. And then he says: here's the next "I will". I will give them unto thee for daughters but not for thy covenant. And I will—here's the third one—and I will establish my covenant with thee. I'm going to do that and thou shalt know that I am the Lord, that thou mayest remember and be confounded, broken, contrite, and never open thy mouth anymore because of thy shame.

You're going to be so broken and so repentant you're never going to do it again. I think of the lady caught in the act of adultery that was drug through the city, plopped at the feet of Jesus. Probably mascara running if they had it in those days or whatever they used, wrapped in a bedsheet, caught in the very act. And the religious people say to Jesus: what does the law say? Well, Jesus knew what the law said. The penalty for adultery in those days is she should be stoned to death. And Jesus doesn't miss a beat, doesn't say a word, he just bends down and he begins to write in the sand.

Wouldn't it be interesting to know what he wrote? Can I tell you what I think? I think he wrote: Pharisee number one, what's the stack of magazines under your bed? Pharisee number two, why were you at Bar X Liquors this last week? Pharisee number three, who's Gertrude? Because your wife's name is Sheila. And one by one they peel off because the religious veneer could not stand in the presence of Almighty God. Here's the second point I want to make. He looks at the woman. Now let me ask you this: if Jesus is standing before you, what accusers can stand beside you? None.

And he looks at the woman and he says: where are your accusers? Because when we're in the presence of Jesus, if we're his, no one can accuse us. And she said: I don't know. And he looked at her and he said: neither do I condemn thee. But now go and don't do this anymore. Do you think she ever did that again? I don't think so. You know the interesting thing is, now we're ending Chapter 16, is that after Israel was restored after that 70-year captivity in Babylon, they sinned in a lot of other ways against God, but they never as a nation fell into idolatry again. God broke them of it.

And I think sometimes in your life and you can think with me tonight, I think sometimes God allows us to fall. He allows us to sin in a way that is so appalling to us that we would never do it again. And he uses it. Think with me: Peter committed blasphemy three times. Jesus said: Peter, listen, I know you think you're going to stand for me when the rest of them aren't, but you need to know, Peter, before this night is done and the cock crows to bring in the morning, you will have denied that you knew me three times. I've already prayed for you, and it is not if you're going to be restored, it is when you come to your senses, continue the ministry I gave you.

For the rest of Peter's life, when he would go to certain cities, people would go: Cock-a-doodle-doo. Seriously. He blasphemed, he blasphemed the name of his Savior and when he came to the end of his life, he said: I'm not worthy to be crucified like him, crucify me upside down. That brokenness never left him, but it became a strong point for him. Paul, he said: I wasted the church. I forced people to deny the name of Jesus Christ that I now hold the most dear. There is a messenger of Satan given to buffet me because of my failures.

That's what they were. It wasn't his eyes or the malaria, people say all that. No, Paul would have handled that, he was tough as nails. But when he put his head on the pillow, he remembered his past failures. He said: God, remove them from me. I'm not going to. Why? Because my grace is sufficient. In your weakness, you're made strong. And it kept a man who could have been a very hard man to deal with, a very legalistic man, it kept him humble so that he could be the author of the New Testament message of grace.

Fourteen of the New Testament letters he writes. He's the one who established the New Testament churches, he's the apostle of grace. 120 times in his writings he mentions grace or teaches on grace in one form or another. All the rest of the apostles put together don't do that. John, who used to put his head on Jesus' chest, only mentioned grace seven times in all of his letters. How do you get a man passionate about grace? Well, you break him so that he has to understand: I am what I am by the grace of God. Then he can preach grace because that's the only message we've got, gang. If you think there's another message, tell me. What is the most important thing that you need from God? Grace.

So let's teach that tough-as-nails, legalistic, critical, judgmental Pharisee, let's take that Saul of Tarsus, let's make him Paul the apostle of grace. Well, how are we going to do that? I think there was a conversation in heaven: well, we'll break him. Well, how are we going to break him? We're going to let him fall on his face and then we're going to reveal ourselves to him. He'll never do it again. God knows how to break us and he will go to the nth degree to do that so that we never fall into that thing again.

So listen, because he's got a purpose and a plan far better for us. Listen to Verse 63 as we end this chapter. Are we going to be able to start the next chapter? I can do it. I can do it in ten minutes. I really can. Now watch this, Verse 63: That thou mayest remember and be confounded, broken, contrite, and never open thy mouth anymore because of thy shame. You'll never accuse another person because you've been a recipient of his grace, of his restoration. When I am pacified... I want you to circle that word "pacified" because I don't think it properly transmits to us the concept.

In Isaiah 53, God says: when I see my son suffering for the atonement of your sins, then I will be satisfied. That's the word for "pacified". In the New Testament we have this word "propitiation". Not "expiation"; expiation is paying the debt. Propitiation is not only paying the debt but satisfying any emotion, any hard feelings that came from the debt. And here God is saying: when I am pacified. What pacified Jesus concerning our debt and whatever hard feelings he had toward us? Jesus.

When I see my son... so this word "pacified", I circled it, I didn't cross it out, I circled it and I said for better clarification, this word should be "atonement". When I atone for your sins through my son Jesus Christ, then I will be satisfied, I will be pacified concerning your bad behavior. Listen, there is only one thing that pacifies the Father's anger toward a sinner and that's the blood of Jesus Christ applied to their life because he paid the debt. When I am pacified toward thee for all, not some or most. What is the worst thing you can... don't, please don't blurt it out. I've had people do that before.

Just think in your head because we don't need our heads knowing what your head knows. Listen, what is the worst thing that you've ever done in this life that you think is so far beyond God ever forgiving you, restoring you, and using you? You've got it in your head? Keep it in your head, but do you have it in your head? Is the blood of Jesus Christ sufficient to wash you of that thing? Is the blood of Jesus Christ and his sacrifice on Calvary's cross, is it sufficient to make the vilest of sinners clean? If your answer is no, you need to go find another church because that's not what we believe here.

We believe that the blood of Jesus Christ and the grace of God is sufficient to make the vilest of sinner pure and clean and acceptable to the Father. Amen? Because if you don't believe that, you're a Pharisee. Or a Sadducee; you're sad because you don't believe in the resurrection. You're sad, you see. But here we believe that we owed a debt we can never pay and he paid a debt he did not owe. And we believe that the blood of Jesus Christ is sufficient to wash and make pure the vilest of sinners, to remove the stain of the worst thing you have ever done from your life so that you can stand before one day a holy God and have his Son as he introduces you to the Father—read Jude 24—and as you're introduced to the Father you will stand there blameless, perfect.

God is saying: although you have strayed from me, you have sinned against me, you have violated this covenant, you went off as a whorish wife and you broke my heart. All the things I gave you, bestowed upon you, you spent them on your lovers. He said: but one day you will remember and you will be broken and you'll never open your mouth again because of your shame when I have atoned, I have done atonement, I am atoned, I'm pacified, I've atoned toward thee for all that thou hast done, saith the Lord God. Listen, God never ends what he starts unless the period that he puts on it is restoration, redemption, regeneration because he's a God whose arm is not short that he cannot save to the uttermost all.

This is what he is asking for: all who would call upon his name. And once you've done that and asked for forgiveness, it's forgiven. Stop thinking about it. Don't let the devil bring it up because he's the accuser of the brethren. When he starts bringing up your past, take it up with Jesus; he already dealt with it. I don't want to hear it anymore because is it not relentless about it? Amen? I've come to the point in my life—and we're going to end here, we're not going to Chapter 17, I lied to you, now I've got to repent for lying. I lied to you guys every week because I think I want to get further than I'm going to go.

But I want to tell you something. I've come to the point in my life because I'm old enough now—and I'm not going to tell you how old I am, but I'm old. I'm older than I look. I really am. I've had people say... maybe they're just being kind or maybe they have need of glasses, but they'll look at me and say: you don't look that old. I don't look 103, do I? No, they'll say you don't look that old. But I'm old enough. I'm 46 years in the Lord. I've been born again for 46 years.

I have now in my life—and I've taught through the New Testament like 17 times, the Old Testament four or five, six, I've written doctrines courses, I've taught in Bible college. And I've walked down the road far enough that I have the benefit, I have the benefit of hindsight. And I can look back over my life and I can say the same as Paul said: from my mother's womb was I separated. Because every failure God used, every success God used. All of those things were shaping me and molding me. And I personally believe for this moment.

God has given this church a worldwide audience, we're in 25 different countries, we have over 19 satellite churches, we have thousands of people across the United States and in Canada that tune in because my message is singular. And I don't just teach it out of my head, I've experienced it in my heart: God is gracious and he is judging this nation. But all he wants from you is to repent. Come to him with a broken and contrite heart and he will not turn you away. We're going to get to that verse soon in Ezekiel where God says: turn ye, turn ye, saith the Lord, why will you perish? I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked.

What I wanted to say and I got ahead of myself—sometimes I do that—is that I look back and those things once the devil used to beat me with, when he tries to beat me with my past, I say: you know what, I thank the Lord for that. Why could you thank the Lord for that? Because it broke me. It hammered Mike Warren out of me and it put something of God in me. And that's what Paul said: I will glory in my scars, the scars that I got from Jesus Christ. Because it is in those times of brokenness where I enter into a depth of relationship with my Father I never had before.

Now, I don't like the process, do not get me wrong, I'm not a masochist. I don't like the process. I don't like the fire, I don't like the anvil, I don't like the hammer, I don't like being dunked in oil. That's how you get temper in something. I don't like it. Mikey does not like it. But I love the product. And there have been times in my life where I'm going through the fire and I know the anvil's just ahead and the hammer's God just forging something out of me and forging something in me, and then he's going to envelop me in the oil of his spirit and every molecule's going to shiver until he puts some temper in me so the things of the world don't bite any longer when you runs the file across it.

Some of you guys understand metallurgy or watched "Forged in Fire". But that's how God gets the Christian where he needs them to be. So don't you ever complain about the fire or the anvil or the hammer or the oil because God is in the business of making you what he wants you to be and sometimes that's just what you've got to go through. You don't have to like the process, but God won't finish until there's a product that he can use. And that's you, that's me, that's us.

So let's stand. You guys are going to fall over thinking you get out here early. I just can't do Chapter 17 justice in ten minutes. Let's get the worship team up here. We'll close out in a last song. But I want you to know just when you think you're done, that's a good thing. "I can't do it anymore!" I've been trying to break you of it for years because you never could do it, you only thought you could do it. If you'd just let go, I'll do it. But you have to surrender yourself to me. How many feel like you hang on when you shouldn't? Stop it!

There was a Christian cartoon years ago, I never forgot it, I probably saw it when I was first saved. There's this guy—you could see the cliff above that he fell off—and he's wrapped around this branch, you could see it sticking out of the cliff, and he's screaming: God help me, God help me, God help me! And the voice answers back: let go. "Oh God, that must be the devil, help me, help me, help me!" The voice answers a second time: let go. And the guy said: God you've got to help me, help me! And you can see the white knuckles finally come loose and he falls. He said: God where are you? Six inches off the ground. He said: I told you to let go, I got you.

And the things you don't understand in those moments of brokenness, just let go because God has a plan. Amen? And when his plan is complete in your life and in mine, when the final sentence is written and the period is placed on that sentence, the last word will be "complete restoration". Amen? Because he finishes what he starts. Aren't you glad? Father, thank you that you finish what you start in our lives. That we can trust you, that you are trustworthy.

Help us, Lord Jesus, to hear your voice, to turn quickly at your discipline, to live in an attitude of repentance, to walk in the spirit and not in the flesh, Lord. We thank you for these things that come to us in Christ. So speak to our hearts, may these things be laid deep in our hearts, Lord we pray. Thank you, Father, that we're done with Chapter 16 and we can move on, and we pray it in Jesus' name. And all God's kids would say: Amen.