Turning On the Lights for Tuesday August 27, 2024 The POWER of the word of God!
Good Morning, Good Morning my brothers and my sisters and welcome to Tuesday’s edition of Turning On the Lights!
This morning we open a discussion about the POWER of the Word of God – that is, the unadulterated, unaltered, rightly divided Word of God.
All of our battles are against the forces of darkness and, as is taught in Ephesians 6, our first measure of “self-defense” is to NEVER deny the TRUTH and put on the shoes of the Good News that Christ lived, Christ died, Christ rose again – for the salvation of all who will believe.
I pray that you will find this informative and inspiring. May God continue to bless and keep you always – and in all ways.
This is a video recorded copy of the FaceBook Live event of Turning on the Lights! – Tuesday, August 27, 2024. Watch here via the YouTube link!
This is an audio recorded copy of the FaceBook Live event of Turning on the Lights! – Tuesday, August 27, 2024. Listen here or through your favorite podcast app!
This is a transcript from the audio of this episode of Turning on the Lights! – Tuesday, August 27, 2024
Good morning. Good morning, my brothers and my sisters better late than never. I got up and got going and my doggies took a little longer than they normally do to go out and eat their breakfast and stuff. You’re looking at the church town church of God. If you’re listening on the podcast, you can always go to at church town church on YouTube and see the posted video if you want to see what the church looks like. It’s a little church, little church on the hill, the sanctuary that you are looking at right now was constructed in 1849. There’s the pulpit. There’s some beautiful flowers, we should have tried to give them away on Sunday. I’m going to give water to them and hopefully they’ll last another Sunday. But if you know of somebody that needs them, come and get them. Here’s the altar of the church. Like I said, 1849 the church was started in 1833 up the road. 1849 we they built we I wasn’t there. They built this sanctuary started it at the beginning of the year. Good morning. And they finished it at the end of the year. And here we are, we are still preaching in this sanctuary today and to think that I don’t know the number of times that it was ever shut down. I know there was only one time and I’ve been here almost 13 years and there’s only one Sunday that we didn’t have church and that was a like a four foot snowfall with eight foot drifts, 12 foot drifts up against the walls. And we couldn’t nobody could come. COVID didn’t shut us down. Nothing else shut us down one Sunday and I’m still convinced that that was the Lord just showing me who’s boss. We’re talking about God’s sovereignty here at Church Town and have been for a while now and I think that me always making the joke while the church will always be open. I only have a 30 foot commute. I think the good Lord decided to shut me up because that was always the running joke like it’ll just be open. You use your own judgment. Well, there were I couldn’t get close to the church. The church was one gigantic snow thing. The Lord said. I’ll show you who’s boss. He does that quite a bit. Good morning, Josh. Good morning everybody. Welcome to Turning on the Lights on this Tuesday morning end of August. It’s supposed to be another hot day went for a beautiful ride last evening of riding in late summer. Even if you have hot days riding in late summer is wonderful. You know riding particularly in the late summer evenings now you don’t have as much evening as you do good morning, Sandy during the middle of the summer, but you have just amazing angles of the sun that interact with the clouds. There’s always a dip in the temperature. It’s hard to describe but late summer is without a doubt my favorite time of year. Oh, ever if they ever colored it had something to do with the outside of the coloring book that God colored. Yeah. That’s what I’m talking about. Yeah. Last night going we we came back up Route 94 from Route 30 and I mean good heavens to murder. Troy gorgeous greens and purples and oranges and blues and whites and just fantastic. So here we are father. We pray that your word would be heard throughout the world today as many many faithful preachers will continue to preach and teach faithfully the word of God in Jesus name. Amen. Hi Lindsay. So where we Friday, I thought we finished off. Matthew 25 quite well. Right and and I think we took a lot out of Matthew 25. As a matter of fact on Saturday, I had something else that I was going to preach at the funeral, but I moved over to Matthew 25 because of what Jesus says at the end of it. It is a lesson that whether because when you’re preaching in front of a crowd like that. Excuse me morning bill. I mean mad Piper Gable. You don’t know I’m you’re preaching salvation. You’re preaching the gospel. Everybody heard the word, but there was also this nugget from Matthew 25 that anybody can take away what you’ve done for the least of these you’ve done to me right because you fed you clothed you visited you cared for love God love your neighbor. Even if you’re not a believer, you can do the love your neighbor part and so I put that in there to try to tie in the the the idea that the gospel is for everybody. I know I wish you happy birthday Kristen happy birthday to you. And so hopefully they saw that there is relevance in the gospel message in the teachings of Jesus. Now you don’t go into the idea that well you can’t really just land on Jesus was a good teacher and that sort of thing as he claimed to be God and all of these what we would call supernatural events followed him around and the miracles and the transfiguration and the baptism and the voice of the father coming up these things made him very unique. You can’t just say well. He was a good wandering rabbi a good teacher. Hard to hold that position with everything that we know about Jesus. I didn’t get into that aspect of it, but I hope that the non believers on Saturday could see some true Christianity some true theology of God some true. Way that Christians are and behave instead of instead of all of the garbage that you see on television and you hear on social media. I mean I do these little social experiments on social media. No I’ve I’ve had to I’ve had to unfollow nearly every media outlet when I when you belong to the or I liked and I followed the local news stations along with ABC and CB. I had to just stop that because it the propaganda machine is just rocking and I never heard from these news stations before you had to go to the page if you wanted to see any news now all of a sudden on my Facebook feed my media feeds the news stations are front and center and guess who is always pictured there right. It’s the Democrat nominee and it’s full blown. Oh my gosh it’s amazing. I just unfollowed them all, but you do do these little social experiments whenever something pops up like that you follow the governor to see what he’s up to now he our governor is obsessed with abortion. He’s obsessed with it. He posts three or four times a week about how abortion will always be safe and legal in Pennsylvania as long as he is governor abortion this abortion if he had his way, it would be free for all women all these different. He’s obsessed with abortion and so you would invoke the name. I one time said may God have mercy on your soul and when you even mentioned the name of Yahweh like you do these like I said, he’s you don’t ask anybody to comment on what you said, but my goodness people just and the vitriol and the hatred and the passion with which they hate God and hate life is just. It’s mind boggling and you get these comments and one person wished I’ve been wished death upon me more than one time simply because I prayed for mercy on a sinner over a sinner. Yeah, there’s something there and that’s going to lead into our little discussion today on the power of the word of God and this is not only why. Individuals must stick to the canon that we have that has been put together divinely inspired by God’s Holy Spirit that as we pray that his Holy Spirit would lead us in his living word, his infallible living word. It will never fail in its purposes for our lives. It will never fail in its purposes for all of humanity. It will never fail. We pray for that. We pray that we would remain Orthodox in that tradition. We pray that we would stick to the word of God that we would not mistranslate misuse add to take away. And that is a tremendous responsibility and it is a tremendous social pressure as I just mentioned. That’s why I said what I said you say may God have mercy on your soul and 58 comments come back. I wish you would die Christian right. A lot of Christians don’t want that smoke. And that is why a lot of Christian leaders don’t want that smoke and Satan knows that we as frail human beings are going to say. Oh my goodness. Nobody likes me. Oh my goodness. This is an uphill battle. Is it worth fighting? Oh my goodness. Maybe word of God is wrong. If all of these people don’t believe in it. There’s a lot of things that can go through your head and this is a true test, but you need to understand the forces at work and the individuals who are so Antichrist don’t understand the forces that are at work within them. The demonic forces that press them into the way that they behave and the way that they think. But you see so much of us. Many pastors preachers church leaders Christian leaders, whatever you wanna call them who maybe we just wanna make a little left hand turn here with the word of God. Maybe we don’t wanna talk to people so much about wrath of God. Maybe we don’t wanna talk so much about sin. Is it really a sin to should we even bring those things up? How well will it sell if I actually bring the full measure of scripture? How well will it sell if I talk about the sermons that Jesus gives the parables that Jesus uses to teach with the gospel message of salvation that Jesus Christ brings. Including the choices that you have and the consequences of those choices. We talked about that last week because Matthew 25 ends with that Jesus never gives you half of the picture. He says salvation is available. I am the way I am the truth. I am the life you come to the father through me. And if you don’t you will be cast into the darkness, the lake of fire where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Talks about that in parable form metaphorically and very directly. Well, how well does that sell? If I’m trying to keep people happy if I’m trying to keep the pews full if I’m trying to keep the coffers full. Well, it’s sold so well for Jesus that they killed him. Now don’t get my theology twisted. I use that as hyperbole. I understand that Jesus’s life was his to lay down and this is the plan of salvation, but we see the reaction that he knew was going to happen. When we’re reading the prophets, I said this on Sunday, all of these false prophets running around schools of prophecy. I’m going I am a prophet. I’m prophet Brian and I will bring this prophetic message to you. God gave me a word for how many of those prophets are really behaving like prophets? How many of those prophets are truly receiving the word of God? I would say none. Because the office of profit ended with Jesus Christ, but how often do you hear one of these modern day prophets prophesy anything other than some sort of vague horoscope prediction? Bad times may have been, but good times are coming. There may have been a period of darkness, but now you will see light in your future. Oh wow. That’s right. I was really down last week and oh good. I’m going to be happy this week. Whatever you don’t hear you when you read the prophets of the Old Testament and we’re going to look at Ezekiel here this week or maybe even today. Have you ever read Ezekiel? Have you ever read Jeremiah? Have do you know the things they went through because they prophesied truth and not falsehood? Do you know what they went through? Oh absolutely not. They’re all made up and understand that and they can be a gateway for sure into the demonic for sure. But you when you when I’m thinking of Jeremiah and Ezekiel, that’s kind of where we are where I am in my two readings right now. Good heavens these prophets true prophets stuck to the truth of the word of God that they were receiving and they were beaten and they were in prison and they were partially drowned and they were thrown in cisterns and they had to carry yokes Ezekiel shaved his head with a sword. I mean God told them to do these things. They were brought Jeremiah was brought before the king how many times because all of the other false prophets were like. Oh everything’s going to be fine. Don’t worry about it. Go attack them. You’re going to be great and Jeremiah is like the wrath of God is coming. You don’t stand a chance repent and you will just repent now and you will actually have a chance to live. You’ll be in exile, but you’ll have a chance to and then it’s like oh kill that guy and God let him live, but you know what I’m saying. So there’s power in the word of God. Power and you see that same reaction Jeremiah and Ezekiel. If you were to post something positive from the truth of God on a public forum. May God have mercy on your soul. The Christians should stay inside your churches blah blah blah. II want you. You should all die. You’ve caused more pain in war. Ignorant just ignorant statements from people are led astray by lies. Marxism the worship of the state the worship of self the worship of power murdered more people in the 20th century alone than all people in all wars before that it wasn’t some religious war. People were being led by demonic forces to worship secular power. That’s what Marxism is it in a way is its own religion. If you want to use that term. But I digress. Let’s start so there’s the preamble to what we’re going to be into for the next few episodes here and that is the power of the word of God this week at church town. We’re continuing our look at the power and the sovereignty of Jesus and we’re going to be looking at his sovereignty over the spiritual realm. His sovereignty over the demonic and that kind of ties into what we’re just talking about actually. Because the demonic does not the demonic only does what it does. Because God allows it to do what it does. He is sovereign over the demons. He is sovereign over all he understands, of course, because he has created these concepts these of good and evil and he has given us a choice. That’s what the full gospel is all about repent and live right Ryan repent and live immerse yourself in the demonic and you will die. You are spiritually dead now and you will be experienced the wrath of God upon your passing. Right here Ephesians six last week, we looked at scriptures that were rather you really hate using these human words common, but very you know people knew them and one of my encouragement was please slow down and read them read the power. We’re like oh Jesus walked on water. This I know is true. He walked on water by his command. The molecular structure of water was changed instantaneously because we know he was a man with mass and weight. This is something that we cannot just glibly glance over every time we must understand his sovereignty over the natural. And so here’s another scripture Ephesians six where we talk about the armor of God and look how the armor of God kicks off if you will a final word be strong in the Lord and in his mighty power put on all of God’s armor so that you will be able to stand firm against all strategies of the devil for we are not fighting against flesh and blood enemies, but but against evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world against mighty powers in this dark world and against evil spirits in the heavenly places. Right when he says this are we taking it to heart understanding that our battles. It’s not just ideology ideology ideological. Thank you very much ideological or ideological. It’s not just political all is the battle of good and evil. I know that that’s a rhetorical question bar because yes is the answer and this is where I feel and this is not a pat on the back, but I feel that I’ve grown in my voice when you I became was called to be a pastor and I became the pastor of this church. I still had a very weak voice and a very strong ego and what do I mean by that is that I could I wanted to be liked I wanted to please everybody. I thought that that was part of my job. My vocation my calling my job if you will is to preach and teach and honor the word of God period. God will take care of the rest and I have utter faith that he will and we have said this many many times if he wants Church Town open, he’ll keep it open. If he wants to close, he’ll close it. It’s his call. It’s his church. We are his people and so over the years, I have found my voice and I am okay teaching and preaching the full measure of scripture and taking the smoke that comes with it. Like I said, I don’t do that on purpose. Well, I mean I don’t do that just because I do do it on purpose to sort of stick your finger in the water of what’s out there and you mention the name of God. You praise Jesus on social media in some you know when when people are talking about wickedness and the demonic. And you’re like, okay, Ephesians six. It’s real man. It’s real. You get a real taste of it. So all right all of our battles are against the evil rulers and authorities of the unseen world against mighty powers in this dark world and against evil spirits in the heavenly places. Therefore, put on every piece of God’s armor so you will be able to resist the enemy in the time of evil. Here we are. And now listen, here’s the first piece. Then after your battle, you will still be standing firm. Stand your ground, putting on the belt of truth and the body armor of God’s righteousness. For shoes put on the piece that come from the good news. The good news of salvation through Christ, the truth of the word of God are the first two pieces of armor. Right to carry this metaphor forward. The gospel that Christ lived, Christ died, Christ rose again for your sake, not his for your sake, you may be covered by his righteousness. And you carry forward the truth of the word of God. Now it’s very striking as Paul, I mean obviously inspired by God’s Holy Spirit and in using the gifts that he had already given Saul, Paul as a very intelligent man is an amazing writer and his rhetoric is so pointed and so well composed that he brings that argument. This is what we are facing in the unseen realm of good and evil. We see it manifest on earth. We understand that it is part of the universe, part of the plan, and we understand that our battles as human beings with these as these special creations of God are not a flesh and blood. This is what the enemy would have us want to do. Battle political ideologies, battle, whatever the case may be. It’s gonna be conservative. It’s going to be liberal. It’s going to be this. It’s gonna be that it’s gonna be anything but good and evil. It’s going to be anything but the truth of the word of God versus the lies of the enemy. And so we’re taught all of these things. We can continue to go on and on, but he says our battles are not that and then he says as we enter into this wicked world, we enter into it with the truth of the word of God literally embedded in our souls, written on our hearts, and we stand firm. Alright, we have the gospel shoes. We stand firm in our gospel shoes. The truth of the plan of salvation. That’s powerful stuff. That’s powerful stuff and let me let me just end with this. We talked about Ezekiel because Ezekiel is on my mind. He’s a unique dude. I mean it was a powerful time in the life of the Hebrews and he used very strong people to fulfill his purposes. You talk about getting smoked today on social media for proclaiming the name of Jesus. The more things change, the more they stay the same. Go back and look at Jeremiah and Ezekiel among the many others. It just happens to be where I am, but here as Ezekiel receives his calling in chapter two in chapter three and this is what we’ll end with today and pick up with on Thursday. Remember. The voice said to me, let’s go back to chapter two verse nine. Then I looked and saw a hand reaching out to me. It held a scroll which he unrolled and I saw that both sides were covered with funeral songs, words of sorrow and pronouncements of doom. The voice said to me, son of man, eat what I am giving you. Eat this scroll. Then go and give its message to the people of Israel. So I opened my mouth and he fed me the scroll. Fill your stomach with this, he said and when I ate it, it tasted as sweet as honey in my mouth. Then he said, son of man, go to the people of Israel and give them my messages. He goes on to say, I’m not sending you to people that won’t understand what you’re saying. I’m sending you to people that should know exactly what you’re saying understand exactly what you are prophesying and they’re going to be blind to it, but you’re going to do your job right. He says right the word of God is quite literally embedded within him. The prophecy of God is within him. The truth of the word is within him and he will go to his people and speak the truth and they will condemn him for it. Power of the word of God, even to his own people, let alone to those who are being led by the demonic. The power of the truth of the word of God, even to his own people. And now this is a picture as well, right? There’s Jesus, the truth of the word of God, the word incarnate, living and ministering and being Jesus the plan of salvation being fulfilled and they condemn him for it. The more things change the more they stay the same and that includes the power, the foundation, the power of the word of God. The more we try to say it’s changed uh uh it has stayed the same. Good is good. God is good. Evil is evil. That hasn’t changed. Father, we pray that this word would penetrate the hearts and minds of individuals who may hear it today. Maybe there is an individual who has been searching, wondering about the truth, wondering about truth in general. Truth capital T is there any? We pray that they would be led to your word and experience the truth of the word of God. Experience the power of the truth of the word of God. The power of the truth of salvation through Christ in Jesus name. Amen. Good lord willing and the river don’t rise. I will see you Thursday morning. We’ll pick up with eating this scroll stuff. Eating the word of God and pick up with the armor of God on Thursday. Until then, what does it say in the Bible? 366 times. Don’t be afraid.
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