No. 33 - IT’S A MATTER OF THE HEART By: John J. Blanchard Saturday, June 28, 2003 This is the fourth in a series on the abomination of desolation and the son of perdition. I would like to call this sermon, “It’s a Matter of the Heart.” In a way it is not for the faint of heart because we are going to take a good strong look at the Church and find out just what happened to us. At the start here I want to make a quick review of the last three sermons. It will be a brief review so that it is fresh in our mind. If you recall, we have learned that prior to Christ’s return there was a physical temple in ancient Israel. We have been comparing that to the spiritual temple that Christ is now building in the New Testament era. Going down through the comparison we found that spiritual temple is composed of spiritual living stones being people. They are people, living stones. We also found that He will dwell in these stones, and they become a house for Him. You can make a note of Ephesians chapter 2 and Hebrews chapter 3, and you will find that we are a house for God. We found that His house is His temple. We also noticed that His house is called the body of Christ. It is also called the bride of Christ. These are described in I Peter chapter 2 as a royal priesthood. These are the saints, a royal priesthood, a holy nation but a spiritual one. We also found that it is a very sanctified and holy place to be part of this temple. To be a part of this body of Christ and part of the bride is a very sanctified and holy place in God’s sight. Lastly we found that we are supposed to be, as part of that temple, a hope of the world. In the last three sermons we noticed that Satan is the son of perdition and has been abominating and desolating this very sacred and holy place. The abomination of desolation is standing in the holy place as warned in Matthew 24:15. The son of perdition sits in the temple of God, as we saw in II Thessalonians 2:4. The son of perdition has caused a falling away from the truth, also mentioned in II Thessalonians 2:3. This has resulted in a scattering of the Church and the power of the holy people being shattered as mentioned in Daniel 12:7. The son of perdition has also caused the fall of the temple as we saw in Matthew 24:1-3. There is not one stone left upon another; we are torn right down to the foundation. We also noticed that the conquering of the temple is Satan’s only hope to win against God. He has been defeated by Jesus Christ when he tried to tempt Christ to accept his deal: to gain the earth without having to suffer and die. Christ refused that deal and thereby sealed Satan’s fate, unless Satan can destroy God’s Church, the body, the temple, that Christ needs to come back to. Satan’s ultimate goal is for him to take over Christ’s position. He wants to rule, if possible, forever. He wants to reign and to continue on. We spent quite a bit a time in Matthew 24:5-7 because we noticed that Satan has accomplished the deception of the fall of the temple with lies. These lies were false signs and wonders, false omens, markers to indicate to get people very fearful, scared and looking at the wrong things rather than paying attention to the temple and the condition of God’s Church, thereby unable to do much about it. So Satan has been very successful in selling us a bunch of lies. You will notice that in Matthew 24:5-7. Christ said do not be troubled by these lies and deceptions for people will try to fool us by pointing to wars, rumors of wars, famines, pestilences, earthquakes, diseases and that sort of thing as signs of My coming. But He said you have always had these. These are not the sign of My coming. So we carefully noted all of these factors. And we have noticed that when one goes back into the historical record (that being the Old Testament) and compare the spiritual destruction of today to what happened back then, we can gain a lot of insight as to why we are in the condition we are in. Ultimately we can see what we can do about it. We will see how can we get on the right page with God. We looked at former and latter fulfillments because the fall of the temple and the fall of Jerusalem in the Old Testament is a former fulfillment of what would happen in the latter days in our time. We have made extensive examinations of physical and historical records comparing them to the spiritual conditions of today. We have compared both the Old Testament temple of Solomon to the New Testament spiritual temple. By comparing the destruction of the past, we can make sense of the destruction that is now taking place in God’s Church. Thankfully we do have a historical record. Thankfully we do have the trials and the tests that ancient Israel went through beforehand and suffered without actually knowing exactly what was going on. They did not fully comprehend what was going on, but those people endured tremendous hardship. We can point out their failures (they had many), but we must remember they did not have the Holy Spirit as we do. They were almost doomed to make these mistakes, but their record is recorded for us so that we have something to look at. We have something to learn from so that we can identify what has happened to us. It is up to us to look at their triumphs and their failures, their trials and their tests and then pay heed. We need to pay serious attention to what happened to them so that we can learn how to avoid what happened to them. As we all know, the entire generation of Moses, except for Joshua and Caleb, did not enter the promised land because of the mistakes that they made. When we look at the devastation of Solomon’s temple and all the work that had gone into it, we better pay attention to what has happened to the spiritual temple today; because the very same thing is happening to us in a spiritual sense. We need to look at the mistakes made in the past and avoid them now. We are no better than ancient Israel was and probably worse for the simple fact that we do have the Holy Spirit. We do have a much more complete body of knowledge. We have the entire Bible, the Old Testament and the New Testament. We have no excuse really. We need to comprehend what God is doing. Since we agreed in the covenant that we made with Him at baptism, we need to follow through with that agreement. Up till now the Church in this generation, this Laodicean Era, has made the same mistakes as what happened to ancient Israel. We are going to pay with eternal consequences if we are not careful. They can at least look forward to the second resurrection. Then they can learn the intensity of what they went through, why and what the consequences were. They will understand why it was so important that they do things right. But they will have a second chance. We who are called now do not have a second chance. It is very important that we pay attention. HARD HEARTS IN OLD TESTAMENT ISRAEL At this point now I would like to conclude the review and then continue with this concept by turning to Hebrews chapter 3. Hebrews 3, starting in verse 1: “Therefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle and High Priest of our confession, Christ Jesus, who was faithful to Him who appointed Him, as Moses also was faithful in all His house. For this One has been counted worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as He who built the house has more honor than the house. For every house is built by someone, but He who built all things is God. And Moses indeed was faithful in all His house as a servant, for a testimony of those things which would be spoken afterward...” So those things were written for our benefit, for those who lived afterward. Continuing in verse 6: “...but Christ as a Son over His own house, whose house we are if we hold fast the confidence and the rejoicing of the hope firm to the end. Therefore, as the Holy Spirit says: ‘Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion...’” This is quoting the Old Testament here. “‘...in the day of trial in the wilderness, where your fathers tested Me, tried Me, and saw My works forty years. Therefore I was angry with that generation, and said, “They always go astray in their heart, and they have not known My ways.” So I swore in My wrath, “They shall not enter My rest.”’” Let’s pay attention. This is a warning looking at what happened to ancient Israel. Verse 12 of Hebrews 3: “Beware, brethren, lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief in departing from the living God...” That is why I titled this sermon, “It’s a Matter of the Heart” because that warning is connected to the condition of our heart and unbelief in the Living God. Verse 13: “...but exhort one another daily, while it is called ‘Today,’ lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.” This is speaking of the hardening of the heart. Verse 14: “For we have become partakers of Christ if we hold the beginning of our confidence steadfast to the end, while it is said: ‘Today, if you will hear His voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion.’ For who, having heard, rebelled? Indeed, was it not all who came out of Egypt, led by Moses? Now with whom was He angry forty years? Was it not with those who sinned, whose corpses fell in the wilderness? And to whom did He swear that they would not enter His rest, but to those who did not obey? So we see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.” We are being told here we better pay attention while it is still today, while we still have time. We better look at the Old Testament example and not repeat the same mistake, because if we do, we may not be allowed to enter the rest. We understand that the rest is the Millennium. We know that that rest is just up ahead. It is a sobering thought: could we really make the same mistake? Are we going to pay attention to God’s word or not? Let’s believe it. Let’s accept that we could make the same mistake and continue reading on in chapter 4. Hebrews 4, verse 1: “Therefore, since a promise remains of entering His rest, let us fear lest any of you seem to have come short of it.” We are being told, let us see if any of us have come short of it. Verse 2: “For indeed the gospel was preached to us as well as to them; but the word which they heard did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in those who heard it. For we who have believed do enter that rest, as He has said: ‘So I swore in My wrath, “They shall not enter My rest...”’ although the works were finished from the foundation of the world.” We are told right here exactly what I mentioned earlier on. Those people went through those sufferings and trials to leave us a record we can learn from. Can you imagine the amount of physical suffering, pain and hardship they went through so that the spiritual temple could look back on them and learn and realize how we need to be cleaned up and made ready to be the bride of Jesus Christ? It is incredible what that nation has endured all these years, ancient Judah and ancient Israel, so that we could learn these lessons. What we see here is they did not have the benefit of the Holy Spirit like we do. If God was angry with them for unbelief, how much more angry will He be with us? They were kept out of a physical promised land, and we are looking forward to a spiritual Millennium on this earth. What a sad thing if we were kept out of it because we did not believe and we made the same mistake that they did. Continuing in Hebrews 4, verse 4: “For He has spoken in a certain place of the seventh day in this way...” We understand the seventh day is the Millennium. “‘And God rested on the seventh day from all His works,’ and again in this place: ‘They shall not enter My rest.’” We want to enter that rest, brethren, so we want to have a good strong sobering look at the Church and ourselves so that we can be believers and be accepted into that rest. Please drop down and continue in verse 11 of Hebrews 4: “Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience. For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the division of soul and spirit, and of joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” We are told right here what God is going to judge us by is the thoughts and intents of the heart. He is going to judge us by the word of God. The word of God is sharper than any two-edged sword. CONDITION OF THE SPIRITUAL TEMPLE This is very sobering because Israel went through a physical hardship because they broke a physical promise with God to be His nation and to obey Him. At baptism we made a spiritual promise to become a household for God, the body of Christ, the bride of Christ. We said we would let Christ live in us. When we break our covenant, it can have eternal consequences. There will be no second chance. God is not going to judge us by whether we kept the physical temple clean enough. Did we observe all of the statutes and judgments physically speaking and all of the sacrifices? No, He is not going to look at those things. He is going to look at our heart. It is a matter of the heart so we best pay attention to what God is saying here. When we make mistakes in our hearts and our thoughts and our intents, we can be held accountable to the point where we will not be allowed to enter the rest. We can do something about it. We change our hearts to come into communion with God, as it were, joining our heart with His. We need to let His heart live in us, His attitudes, His Spirit dwell there. The Church today is a huge mess. Today will you hear His voice reading these scriptures and not harden your hearts? Will we soften our hearts and let God talk to us from His word? Mr. Herbert Armstrong said years ago the temple is being measured, and the temple is a spiritual dwelling. We were being checked over by God. We were being measured to see if we came up correct, plumb, true, level, a stone that could be laid into a spiritual building. Here we are a long time after Mr. Armstrong’s death now, almost 18 years. The temple is still being measured and I do not see it coming up clean. We are not laid properly. If anything we are a horrible mess. We have literally been thrown down just like the first temple of Solomon. We have been thrown down to the foundation because of the condition we are in. Yet we still have people teaching us to look at physical signs and wonders pointing to Christ’s return. I am telling you we have to stop looking at physical signs, physical wonders and physical omens and pay attention to the spiritual devastation that is all around us. We cannot see it with our physical eyesight; but with God dwelling in us, we should be able to see it with spiritual eyesight. I caution all who are hearing this tape, without vision, we perish. That means there is no Millennium for us! We will have missed that rest. Let us pay attention to God’s word because the only thing that matters right now is what God thinks of us. It is not what we think of each other, not what we think of other church groups and not what we think of the world but what God thinks of us. All that matters is what do we look like to Him? When He looks at His Church, what does He see? We know it is a matter of the heart. God looks at the heart. He does not look at the physical human being. He looks at the heart. He does not look at a physical sandstone temple in the Middle East. He looks at our heart. Let’s pay attention. Let us also judge ourselves by the condition of our heart. The comprehension now of the abomination of desolation and the son of perdition is awful, because we see that the sum of evidence points clearly that the son of perdition is abominating and desolating a holy place for it stands there in the holy place. It stands in the temple of God. In essence, when we have let a false god into the temple, we have done nothing other than to give our hearts to another god! We have actually given our hearts to another god. We like to point the finger at ancient Israel and tell them they rejected God; that Old Testament Israel would not believe God and that is why they went through all of that; that the Jews killed Jesus Christ and that is why they have been forced to suffer. We are making the same mistake only far more serious! We have given our heart to another god, and we are letting it run the temple of God. Let us turn to Psalms chapter 44, start in verse 20 and read to 22. Brethren, let us listen to these words! If we have forgotten the name of our God and stretched out our hands to a foreign God, would God not be able to figure this out? Do we still look like a holy body to Him? Does the spiritual temple of God still look like a clean place to dwell? Of course not! We learned in II Thessalonians chapter 2 that the restraining one has stepped out of the way so that the son of perdition has set himself up there showing himself that he is now god. Let us back up to verse 17 here and read a few more scriptures surrounding these passages to get the full depth of the meaning. Read verses 17 to 19 of Psalm 44. You see self-righteous people in the Church saying we have not forgotten You, God. We still keep the Sabbath, the holy days, we still tithe and we still call ourselves the Church of God. We are commandment keeping, yet look what You have done to Your Church. You have allowed us to be scattered and thrown down. You have severely broken us in the place of jackals, which means demons are having their way with God’s Church! You have “covered us with the shadow of death.” We have learned that the shadow of death is Satan’s shadow upon the earth. It is now shadowing the Church blocking out the sun’s light. Reread verses 20 to 22. So this is a self-righteous way of saying what is going on here, God? The Church is being thrown down, we are spiritually being destroyed; yet we are keeping the commandments and doing what You want. What is wrong? Read Psalm 44:22-26. That is a prayer we better start praying! If we cannot understand what has happened to God’s Church and we just cannot see how we are responsible for this mess at all, we need to beg God for help for vision to see. Because He can redeem us and He can fix us up, and no one else can. We need His mercy now more than ever before! All of this destruction has come upon us for a very good reason. We have forgotten our God and it is a matter of the heart. Our hearts have become hardened, and we have become spiritually drunk with Satan’s doctrines and Satan’s attitudes. These are doctrines of destruction, which we see all around us with people saying that the earth deserves to die and deserves to get destroyed. They are saying God is allowing this to happen because you do not obey Him. We know this world is deceived. We have studied Jonah and have found we do not want to be like Jonah, condemning the world to destruction when they do not know their right hand from their left hand. We can have this attitude (condemning the earth) or we can have an abolishing of the law and no longer believe that the law has any meaning for the Church today. We can be throwing out as it were the old covenant entirely (the law entirely), hanging on to, as they say, Jesus Christ. If we are making either one of these mistakes, we are getting drunk with the doctrines of Satan and with his attitudes. He hates the law as well. He hated both the old covenant and the new covenant. He wants us to lose our way and not be ready to marry Jesus Christ. This is his goal with the abomination of desolation, and that is to make us unfit to marry Jesus Christ. If there is no bride fit for Him to marry, no temple fit for Him to return to, we inadvertently continue Satan’s reign which is exactly what he wants! Mr. Herbert Armstrong felt that Christ could have come back way back in 1978 or 1979. He said I do not know what is keeping Him except possibly that we are not ready! Here we are 25 years later and Christ still is not back yet. So who gained those 25 years? Satan! He has gained more time. Ultimately if he could reign in God’s temple, reign in the body of Christ and keep Christ from ever coming back, he would win! He could not defeat Christ when Christ walked the earth, but he is doing a good job of defeating the body at this point. God is going to pull us out of the fire, but we may not all make it! That is why this is such a serious matter. We need to pay very close attention to God’s word regarding the abomination of desolation and the son of perdition and what is going on in God’s Church; because if we do not pay attention and we do not receive vision from God and help from Him, we could be doomed. We could, at the very least, lose our reward; but we could lose it all. PREVENTING MARRIAGE TO CHRIST We looked at those doctrines and we saw the net effect, but I want to review that more closely today and then continue on with this concept of not being fit to marry Jesus Christ. Turn, if you would, to I Timothy chapter 4, starting in verse 1: “Now the Spirit expressly says that in latter times...” That is, the latter days, our generation now. “...some will depart from the faith, giving heed to deceiving spirits and doctrines of demons, speaking lies in hypocrisy, having their own conscience seared with a hot iron.” We looked at this and we compared it to II Thessalonians chapter 2. We found that, yes, this is what is being spoken of there. We have taken on lies, and those lies are the doctrines of demons. In verse 2 it says that, “speaking lies in hypocrisy.” We have had our “own conscience seared with a hot iron.” We studied those words “seared” and “conscience” and found out that is becoming hard hearted. We have our hearts hardened, our minds hardened. They are so hard we can tell the world six to six and a half billion of you deserve to die! You deserve to die in pestilence, earthquakes, fires, nuclear wars, diseases and all manner of heinous things, because you continue to reject God. When we know for a fact most of the world is deceived and has no idea. Not just most of the world but the whole world. They don’t have a prayer! We are the ones to understand and have hope for them. This searing of the conscience does what? Verse 3: “...forbidding to marry, and commanding to abstain from foods which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and know the truth.” What are we being told here? Are we told here that the doctrines of demons are to say do not eat certain foods? Or are the doctrines of demons forbidding us to marry people? We have heard that some churches have doctrines this way, forbidding ministers to marry. Or some religions forbid certain foods to be eaten. We know God’s Church itself says do not eat unclean food. So what is being talked about here? Are these the doctrines of demons? No, it is far more serious than that. It is a matter of the heart because we have forgotten God. We are spiritually drunk with Satan’s doctrines and his attitudes. What has that done? I already said it. It made us unfit at this point to marry Jesus Christ. That is the marriage being spoken of here! How can we prove this? Simply by looking up the words in the Greek. It is very important that we do understand this, because Satan’s goal is to keep us from marrying Jesus Christ and to keep us unfit with these doctrines of demons. Think about this because in the last days God’s Church is being told that it cannot marry Jesus Christ because it is unfit. This is what God’s message is to us. It is far beyond just physical food and a physical marriage. It is describing the hard heart of God’s Church at the end time. Before I define these words I want you to flip over to II Timothy. This is what we did in the last sermon. II Timothy chapter 3, starting in verse 1 and read to verse 5. That is why the Church can say we keep the Sabbath and the holy days, we tithe, we are the Church of God. But we have become lovers of ourselves and lovers of money. We blaspheme God by besmirching His name with the attitudes and qualities of Satan. We are very unforgiving and unloving and very much without self control and very brutal. Because we condemn those who have no hope. We condemn those who are ignorant. We are very harsh in our judgments between one another and between Church groups. We are very harsh in our judgment of the world. This makes us a traitor to the world and a traitor to God and His Church. We have perfectly fulfilled these scriptures right here in the condition of the Church! The abomination of desolation has made this possible in the last days. Turn back to I Timothy chapter 4 and let us look at those words: forbidding to marry. Let’s look at forbidding. In the Greek forbidding means, “to prevent, to curtail.” If you would like to look those numbers up for yourself, which I recommend, are 2967 and 2849. It is not a matter of actually forbidding. That was not a good translation. It is what physical man could understand. They cannot understand these spiritual concepts so they did the best they could with their understanding. Of course, they like to point at other churches and say they forbid to marry. It actually says that when we take on a doctrine of demons it prevents or curtails us from marriage! We know that the body of Christ is to be the bride for Christ and to marry Jesus Christ. That word abstain is number 567 which means to hold one’s self off or to refrain, so we keep ourselves away from good food. When we take on the bad doctrines, it keeps us from good food that would make us healthy and strong. That term food is meats in the King James which comes from number 1033. Foods is related in number to 1006 which means pasture, fodder or grazing. Physical food is one thing, but in God’s mind He is talking about pasture for His sheep, fodder and grazing. He is talking about good food that is of a spiritual nature that He feeds us with that would make us suitable to marry Jesus Christ. So the doctrine of demons do just the opposite. It is bad food. It has bad results. We bear the wrong fruit. Instead of kindness, compassion and mercy, we are full of the brutalness, the violence, the hard heartedness that we read earlier. Therefore, the doctrines of demons that sear our conscience and make us hard hearted, make us unfit to marry Jesus Christ and keep us from good pasture, good food and good doctrine. What does that sound like to you? It sounds like a fulfillment of Ezekiel 34. Let us turn back to Ezekiel 34 and read a scripture that is probably familiar to most of us. I know Mr. Armstrong used to refer to this fairly often, at least especially in the last part of his life. BAD SHEPHERDS Ezekiel 34, starting in verse 1 and read to verse 3. It sounds like what we read earlier in Psalms. We are slaughtered all day long. Continue with verses 4 to 5. That is the abomination of desolation. The bad food caused the sheep to be scattered and the walls of the spiritual temple to be torn down. Continue reading in verses 6 to 10 of Ezekiel 34. God says I am going to take My flock back. I am going to require it at your hand because you have fed them bad food and it caused them to get hard hearted and unsuitable to marry My Son. We are going to have to take care of this matter Ourselves. But God does not just lay the blame on the shepherds here. If you drop down to verse 17, the entire Church shares in the blame. Read verses 17 to 18. God says what have you done to My pasture? What have you done to the water that I was watering My sheep with and the pasture with? What have you done? You have made it filthy and unfit for food. It is a spiritual unfitness. Continue reading verses 19 to 20. God is going to judge between the fat and the lean sheep. If you were to continue reading you would see that some rams push the others. The sheep get in each other’s way. The big ones make themselves the boss. They keep the others from the food. They are almost all being fed bad food. God says I am going to require My flock for this situation because My flock has now become unfit. They are eating bad food and they are drunk. They are drunk with the attitudes and the characteristics of Satan. They have taken on Satan’s character instead of God’s. We are now bearing the wrong fruit and the wrong attitudes. Just as the attitudes of the Spirit bearing the fruits of the Spirit are love, joy, peace, long suffering and patience, this divisive attitude, judgmental spirit and harsh attitude we see are the fruits of the other side. These are Satan’s fruits. His fruit is what keeps us drunk and unfit for the marriage and it is extending his reign upon the earth. Fear and selfishness is what it is called. We have become a very selfish Church, a very hard hearted Church and yet a very fearful Church. Fear is sometimes a tactic that can be used to get people to do what you want. I think people are afraid. We have allowed people to convince us by false signs, wonders and omens to be scared to death. Too many of us are looking at our own self-preservation. We see the end times upon us, and we are willing to allow over six billion people to perish as long as we are okay. As long as our family will be safe, it is okay if the rest of the world gets destroyed! This is a form of drunkenness. It is an extreme form of selfishness and it is an extremely hard heart. It is the opposite of what the temple of God is for. We are to bring hope to the world. We are not to scare them. We have tried to scare them so well, we have scared ourselves. Satan is the one who has done it. There are Church members around the world hoarding food, hoarding money and looking for a place of safety at the expense of their neighbors and their friends. This is no way for God’s Church to act. This is not the way the apostles acted. It is not the way Jesus Christ acted but yet it is the way the Church is today. It is almost every man for himself. Get me to that place of safety, Lord. God hates that concept. Turn to Isaiah chapter 28 and we will look into that a little bit more deeply here. Mr. Armstrong used to warn us. He said I do not really understand where the place of safety is. If any place is pointed to on earth if it is physical it is Petra. But he said I do not know for sure. At least he was honest. He did not know, but we all took off running with what he did not know and made it so that we think we know. Mr. Armstrong used to say that if you are out there to save your own hide, it is a wrong attitude, and you will never make it there anyway. That is what we have today: a Church trying to save their own hide. Starting in Isaiah 28, verse 1: “Woe to the crown of pride, to the drunkards of Ephraim, whose glorious beauty is a fading flower which is at the head of the verdant valleys, to those who are overcome with wine!” So God says woe to the drunkards who are heading My Church, as you will see, that are at the head of these valleys that should be bearing fruit for God. He says they are drunk! They have been overcome with wine. Continue reading verses 2 to 5. Just like it said in Ezekiel 34, He will take His people for Himself. The shepherds have led people astray; and if Christ has to take them Himself, He will. He will be a crown for the people. Verse 6: “For a spirit of justice to him who sits in judgment, and for strength to those who turn back the battle at the gate.” Jesus Christ is looking for some who will turn back the battle at the gate. That is the gate of the spiritual temple. Pray that we will have the courage to look at ourselves, to humble ourselves before God and admit that we have made some serious mistakes of the heart because then we can help turn the battle back at the gate. Continue reading in verses 7 to 8. Compare that to Laodicea in Revelation 3 being vomited out of Christ’s mouth. Read Isaiah 28:9 and 10. God is telling us here, who am I going to teach? The crown, the pride of Ephraim, My jewels who should have known better, My shepherds, they no longer will take sound doctrine because they are drunk with false doctrine. Who do I have left? Just babes? I think it is coming down to that. Read verse 11 to 12. Brethren, precept upon precept, line upon line will be understood as if a stammering tongue in the last days. Why? If you were to look up that stammering tongue you would find it is a tongue that they do not understand. It is a tongue that people do not understand because you are going back to God’s thinking, as we have looked at so many times (Isaiah 55). We are trying to understand God’s thoughts and convey them with physical language and we need every tool we can have from God to comprehend. We need the historical record of the Old Testament. We need the heavens above us, as David said. We need the creation around us, as Romans 1 said. We need to put everything together that God has given us with the scriptures to understand how He is going to fulfill His plan. The people who are bent on destruction and horrible tribulation of the earth cannot understand for they are drunk. To them it is a foreign language. Notice also in verse 12 that this is what keeps people from the rest and from the times of refreshing. So we are looking at the same thing we saw in Hebrews. We are going to bring a rest and refreshing to the whole world here eventually, and they will learn! Continue reading in verse 13 to 14 of Isaiah 28. We see here it truly is the rulers, the teachers, the shepherds of Jerusalem, that spiritual city. Verse 15: “Because you have said, ‘We have made a covenant with death, and with Sheol we are in agreement. When the overflowing scourge passes through, it will not come to us, for we have made lies our refuge, and under falsehood we have hidden ourselves.’” We are being told directly here if you feel you have some sort of safety, then you have made a deal with Sheol representative of death that Satan leads people to. You have made a deal with Satan, and you think you are going to be safe. You will not. God says the purpose of My temple and My people is not to save their own hides. It is to help save the world. Continue reading in verses 16 to 19. Brethren, this is a very serious warning for us in the Church. This covenant over the place of safety, this hiding place, will be annulled. The hiding place has nothing to do with physical safety. It has to do with protection from false doctrine. Be thankful if you have been protected from false doctrine. Almost everyone I know in the Church including myself has been tainted by false doctrine. We must be willing to admit that and ask God for help to see where we have gone wrong, then get rid of it. This will help put us back in His good graces. It will help Him with the temple. This is a very serious warning because once that overflowing scourge is passing through the land (once the Day of the Lord is here), God is finished measuring His temple. It will be a terror to understand that we have missed out and that we may not be able to enter the rest because we have made a serious error in judgment. We let Satan dwell in our minds and in our hearts bearing his fruit instead of God’s. This is a very serious warning. We must realize that the Church, as a whole, is drunk right now with a lack of compassion, a lack of love for one another and a lack of love for the world. We are missing it. We have become extremely selfish and hard hearted. The living stones are now out to save their own hides, and we are not bearing our responsibility. We are not bearing our cross, as we learned in the sermon by that title, “Bear Your Cross”. WHAT TO DO The living stones are mentioned in I Peter chapter 2. Verse 1: “Therefore, laying aside all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and all evil speaking...” If we want to be in God’s temple, this is what we must do. Get rid of every bit of malice, deceit, hypocrisy or evil speaking. Continue reading in verses 2 to 6. We just read that in Isaiah 28. Jesus Christ is the foundation and the cornerstone. The apostles and prophets are the foundation and Christ is the cornerstone of that temple. If we want to be living stones in it, we must get rid of all malice, deceit, hypocrisy, envy and evil speaking. We must become the perfect bride of Christ. We must be full of love and bearing the fruits of Jesus Christ and not the fruits of Satan the devil. We must be taking on the character of God and not Satan’s character. This is a big deal, brethren. If we do not get rid of the selfishness, at some point in time we will face the terror of our knowledge, the terror of the mistake that we have made. We will have to look at ourselves and admit that we are not better than ancient Israel. As a matter of fact, we are far worse! Do not try to save your life. Jesus Christ said that in a number of locations. Let us turn to Matthew 16 to put this in perspective. Listen to these words once again. When Christ was speaking, it was important to listen. Matthew 16, starting in verse 24: “Then Jesus said to His disciples, ‘If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.’” That is what we are to do. We have found out that taking up the cross (the word cross) means extinguishing all selfishness. Continue with verses 25 to 27. We want to be told, Well done, good and faithful servant. We want to be told, Thank you for picking up your cross, extinguishing all selfishness and following Me. Thank you for loving the world, allowing Me to use your body and your life, to dwell in you and you becoming a sacrifice for the world just as I did. This is not a matter of gaining our physical lives or saving them. This is a matter of losing it for everyone else. When we are deceived and lulled into a sleep, a drunkenness, looking for a place of safety for physical protection, we have missed the boat! We have allowed the deception of Satan and the lies to come into our lives. It should never have come into the temple of God, but it did. We are going to go back to Proverbs and take some advice from Proverbs. Proverbs chapter 23, verse 22. “Listen to your father who begot you, and do not despise your mother when she is old.” Yes, this is good advice for our physical fathers and mothers. But we know we have a Father who has begotten us spiritually. We need to pay attention with far deeper understanding now. Verse 23: “Buy the truth, and do not sell it, also wisdom and instruction and understanding. The father of the righteous...” (that is God) “...will greatly rejoice, and he who begets a wise child will delight in him. Let your father and your mother be glad, and let her who bore you rejoice.” We know the Church is a type of a woman. CHURCH HAS BEEN BEATEN Continue reading verses 26 to 29. We just saw that in Ezekiel 34. Who on this earth is more sorrowful than God’s Church at this point and full of untended wounds? Read Proverbs 23 verses 30 to 32. We are not talking about wine in a bottle. Mixed wine is mixed doctrine, the doctrine of God mixed with the doctrine of Satan. Verse 33: “Your eyes will see strange things, and your heart will utter perverse things.” This is exactly what the Church is doing. Read verses 34 to 35. We have been beaten now since Mr. Armstrong’s death, indeed since about 1979, he said, when the Church was taken over by the receiver. He said this is going to get worse and worse until Christ returns. The Church is being beaten with many stripes to learn that it is naked and without shame. We have not learned. We are poor, blind, naked and miserable and do not even know it. Here is another example. We are being beaten to wake us up and we do not even know it! We blame everybody else. We blame the rest of the Churches. We blame the world. We condemn the earth, but we do not look at ourselves. We are blind! We are, indeed, drunk. We do not even know what is going on. We have to ask God for help and take this advice. Seek truth and sell it not. Buy wisdom and understanding while we still can. Put out the doctrines that have made us drunk with Satan’s characteristics. If we do this, we will avoid both Ezekiel 34 and Ezekiel 13 that we are going to take a look at right now. If you would please turn to Ezekiel 13. These are scriptures that we have read before regarding the fall of God’s temple, but we are going to reread them today because I think we have an even deeper knowledge now. Starting in verse 1: “And the word of the Lord came to me, saying, ‘Son of man, prophesy against the prophets of Israel who prophesy, and say to those who prophesy out of their own heart, “Hear the word of the Lord!”’” You see again it is a matter of the heart. Continue reading in verses 3 to 5. They have not built the temple of God. They have not helped shore up the temple for the Day of the Lord. They have torn us down, and we have gone along with it in many cases! Read verses 6 to 8. These are lies. That is what they are called in II Thessalonians. That is what it is called in II Timothy 3 and I Timothy 4. Those are verses that talk about these doctrines of demons and the lies that have come into God’s Church. They have torn us apart. These lies are futile visions that means vain. They are vain visions (vanity) in the King James. When we looked up those terms we have seen that vanity is going back to what the earth used to be: a wilderness and destroyed place with the surface in utter desolation. God says that is futile. I am not going to allow that to happen to My creation. Continue reading in verses 9 to 16 of Ezekiel 13. God is sick and tired of people saying the Church is going to a place of safety while the world gets condemned to a futile state, a vain state of tohu and bohu (just a waste of destruction). God says I am not sending that message. It is not from Me. I am sick and tired of people casting aspersions upon My name by getting the world to see that I am a harsh and cruel God because I am not. I gave My only Son to save this place, and you are mischaracterizing Me. You are drunk with false doctrines. You are making Me look like Satan, and I am sick of it. This false temple that has been built and this concept of a place of safety to protect all of you instead of being living stones and sacrifices for mankind is going to be annulled. There are going to be dire consequences for those who will not give it up. We have to give up these ideas, brethren. We are here for the world’s sake. We are here to be a hope for the world. We are not to condemn them. If we do, we are far worse than ancient Israel was. If we start espousing the doctrines of demons, we are helping the other side. We are not helping God. We become a part of the darkness. We take away the light from the world, and we bring in its place darkness. We bring a deep sadness to the earth. Continue reading in verses 17 to 18 of Ezekiel 13. Do you think you are going to destroy My people and the earth and keep yourself alive? Continue reading in verse 19. God is sick and tired of this situation, and it is about to come to an end. But He is going to help us repent if we will humble ourselves. We need to humble ourselves. Read Ezekiel 13:20-23. This is the same thing we are told in Ezekiel 34. God is going to take matters into His own hand and deliver His people because we have become like foolish women it says. That is just what the ten virgins are. We have gone to sleep. We have gotten drunk. We have taken on foolish visions of the future for mankind. We have condemned one another. God has had it with this situation. God’s will will be done, brethren. Turn to Isaiah 45. God is going to be victorious in this, and Satan is not going to stay victorious. God’s will will be done, and He is going to win big! Isaiah 45, starting in verse 18: “For thus says the Lord, who created the heavens, who is God, who formed the earth and made it, who has established it, who did not create it in vain, who formed it to be inhabited: ‘I am the Lord, and there is no other. I have not spoken in secret, in a dark place of the earth; I did not say to the seed of Jacob, “Seek Me in vain;” I, the Lord, speak righteousness, I declare things that are right.’” God created the earth to be inhabited. Satan wants it destroyed. If he cannot have it, he wants to hand it back to Jesus Christ at His second coming as a pile of ashes and a ruination without form and void. It is not going to happen. Christ is not going to allow it and God the Father will not allow it. WILL WE MARRY CHRIST? If you were to look up the term “inhabited” in your Strong’s Concordance, you would find it is number 3427 to sit down and remain, to marry. The earth is going to be inhabited and it is going to have within it people in God’s temple who will marry Jesus Christ. Will we be there? That is the question of the day. Will each of us be there or we will be of those who will not see, who will not repent, and hang on to the vicious lying divinations? If we do, we are bearing fruit of the wrong god. We have taken on the image of the wrong god. God cannot tolerate that in His temple. The king of Babylon is going to be cast down. His mountains and his government will be thrown to the ground. He himself and the angels that he leads will go into the bottomless pit. Those of us who are with him and who will not stop this, may end up in the same situation for God’s mountain will be established. The spiritual government of Satan will be destroyed. The earth will not be destroyed. The earth will be a beautiful place in the Millennium. That is the rest that we are talking about. That is the rest we are giving as a hope to the world. We want the people to have glad tidings and good news. We do not want the world scared to death, and we do not need to be afraid of our God either. This preaching that makes us all fearful comes from Satan. We are supposed to trust God, love God, know God and know that what He wants is good. GOD WANTS OUR HEARTS God wants our hearts back now. He wants it to be a perfect heart. We can do it with His help. We have a lot of repenting to do. Turn back to Psalm 101. We are going to look at a few scriptures about the heart. Psalm 101, starting in verse 1: “I will sing of mercy and justice; to You, O Lord, I will sing praises. I will behave wisely in a perfect way. Oh, when will You come to me? I will walk within my house with a perfect heart.” In our house we need a perfect heart then we can meet Jesus Christ. What is that for? To marry Him! Continuing in verse 3: “I will set nothing wicked before my eyes; I hate the work of those who fall away...” That is the falling away that we read about in II Thessalonians and Timothy. “...it shall not cling to me. A perverse heart shall depart from me; I will not know wickedness. Whoever secretly slanders his neighbor, him I will destroy; the one who has a haughty look and a proud heart, him I will not endure. My eyes shall be on the faithful of the land, that they may dwell with me; he who walks in a perfect way, he shall serve me. He who works deceit shall not dwell within my house; he who tells lies shall not continue in my presence. Early I will destroy all the wicked of the land, that I may cut off all the evildoers from the city of the Lord.” Time will be cut short, brethren. That is what we are being told here. Time will be cut short to preserve this earth. We better believe it! Because if we do not believe, we are not going into that place of rest. If we become a curse for mankind and we spread the wrong name of God around, we are going to be held accountable. We cannot spread lies. We must spread God’s truth and give hope to mankind. Turn back, if you would, to Psalm 95. Read verses 1 to 11. We like to point at these scriptures and talk about ancient Israel’s mistakes, but these scriptures were quoted in Hebrews. They were quoted at us, God’s people, at the temple! It is the temple that has taken on the characteristics, the qualities and the attitudes of Satan the devil and the doctrines of demons. We have become a filthy place in God’s eyes. With His help, we can get cleaned up. But we have to turn to Him and repent. We have to start preaching good news and good thoughts. We need to ask God to clean our hearts, because it is a matter of the heart. REPENT It is time to pray David’s prayer of repentance, and it is time to fast like Daniel did so that the Church can come back out of its captivity and throw off the shackles of Satan. Our God may yet remove the son of perdition from the holy place. The abomination of desolation will be halted if we stand in the gate, pray to God and humbly ask Him to clean us up. Ask Him to clean our hearts and make it possible for us to help Him and not hurt the earth, the brethren or ourselves. Let us read some of David’s prayer of repentance by going back to Psalm 51. Starting in verse 7, read to verse 17. God wants us to give Him a broken and a contrite heart. He wants us to stop teaching lies and teach what a wonderful God He is. It is all a matter of the heart. Do we want to be soft and gentle, compassionate and loving, or hard hearted? It is a decision that we need to make and we need to make it very quickly. God is looking for those who humble themselves, have a contrite heart and repent of the errors of their ways. The next time I hope to conclude this series with a sobering message to the bride so that we can wake up, we can trim our wicks and get ready for the imminent coming of Jesus Christ!