The Jewish Final Solution to the World's Problem - The Progress of Doctrine Marches On.

[0:00] 1 Corinthians chapter 1. And today we are talking about the progress of doctrine moving right along, and it is going to be perhaps a different kind of message.

[0:12] I trust that it will be coherent and cohesive, and we'll be able to plug in ancient history to what is happening today, because there most definitely is a connection.

[0:25] And a verse that I'd like to draw your attention to that is very often just kind of overlooked. We had one of those in our 9 o'clock hour this morning, but this particular one is here in 1 Corinthians chapter 1, and it is an interesting concept that Paul is talking about here.

[0:50] In verse 22 of chapter 1, the apostle says, For indeed, Jews ask for signs.

[1:04] Now, the word sign in the Greek is the word semion. It's a word from which we get the word semaphore. And it has to do with something to look at, something visible, something that is obvious, something that you can see.

[1:21] And the most prevalent way that the word sign works out is with a miracle, with something that can be attested to by the eyes. You see it right before your very eyes.

[1:34] It is an undeniable thing. And this is characteristic, Paul tells us, of the Jewish people. The Jews seek a sign, or miracles.

[1:45] I guess we could say that God related to the Jew, the ancient Jew particularly, in such a way that he actually caused them to expect and anticipate miracles.

[2:03] And then he goes on to say, the Greeks search for wisdom.

[2:16] That's kind of a contrast. And he's thinking in terms of the Greek mindset, which was very deeply engaged in philosophical thinking, and produced the great minds that Greece was famous for with their philosophers, the Socrates and Plato's and Aristotle's and so on.

[2:35] They were accustomed to that. So it's like Paul is saying, the big thing that really turned on the Jews were the miracles.

[2:47] And the thing that really turns on the Greeks is the intellect, the human intellect, powers of reasoning and logic.

[2:58] And then he says, but what we have to share is completely contrary to both of those, because what we have is something altogether different. And we preach, but this is a contrast, but we preach Christ crucified, something that is completely foreign to both of those concepts.

[3:19] We preach Christ crucified to the Jews. The whole idea is a stumbling block. And to the Gentiles, it's nonsense. Just doesn't make any sense at all.

[3:32] So before we get into the implications of this and the progress of doctrine, I want to give you a brief propositional history lesson, I guess I would say, because what we are talking about and what is happening in our world today, particularly in the Mideast, that virtually has all the rest of the world on edge.

[3:59] It goes all the way back to what we are going to be talking about now. There is a cohesiveness and a coherence to all of history.

[4:11] And what is taking place today is nothing more than a predictable outcome of what has taken place in the past. So bear with me.

[4:24] For these past many months, we have been focusing upon the history of the world, particularly as viewed through the lens of the Bible. We're talking, of course, about our morning services and our intent on dealing with the subject of the Jewish final solution to the world's problems.

[4:49] Much has gone on in the world's history, not found in the Bible. Entire civilizations have existed and flourished that are not included in the scriptures.

[5:02] Asian nations like China, Japan, with the Mongol empires, Russia and her neighbors, Africa, especially with the biblical significance of Egypt, the ancients of the Incas and the Aztecs have all made their mark on the world scene, right out of the geographical assignment they were given in the table of nations found in Genesis chapter 11.

[5:25] This chapter tells us where all these people were assigned to when their languages were confused at the Tower of Babel. This incident was little more than an early on rebellion of humanity against divine authority.

[5:41] The rebellion goes on today in all these nations. As great and as significant as these people were, they do not compare to the strategic nature of the people in the ancient and present day area known as the Mideast.

[6:00] These nations are today identified in the Bible and on our current maps as ancient Israel, Syria, the biblical name of Babylon, which today on our maps is Iraq, Assyria, which is north of that, Asia Minor, which is modern day Turkey, and the Persian Empire, now known as Iran, ancient Greece and Italy, and others comprising the Mediterranean basin.

[6:34] These represent the core of human history, and they will be the focus point for the demise of humanity, as it has been known.

[6:46] The demise of humanity, I say, and this demise appears to be rapidly approaching, with incidents of international significance seeming to occur almost daily.

[7:00] This area, the Mideast, returns to front and center of the world stage in a way it has not occupied for centuries.

[7:11] It's easy for New York, Washington, London, and Paris to think they are surely the most significant of all. But they are not.

[7:23] Satan himself returns to the scene of the crime, and it is right here in the Mideast. Think of the Mideast as a giant target.

[7:35] Then, place the nation of Israel in the bullseye. Here is where the divine strategy designed to combat Satan actually began, in a flurry of personalities that would issue forth from one source, named Abraham.

[7:58] Abraham. He would father a protagonist in the name of Isaac, and an antagonist in the name of Ishmael.

[8:10] These two would begin an intractable conflict, continuing to this very day. Abraham's offspring of Isaac would also father a protagonist, and an antagonist in the persons of Jacob and Esau.

[8:31] These brothers exacerbate the conflict already begun with their ancestors. Today, as we speak, their descendants remain engaged in conflict that concerns all the rest of the world's nations.

[8:50] Does all this current conflict involving the direct descendants of Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Ishmael, and Esau, do they move humanity toward the final scene of human history?

[9:06] It does appear to be the case. While we cannot be certain of this, nor can we determine just how far in the future it will be, it does bear the necessary components described in Scripture as the final showdown between these age-old enemies.

[9:27] All the rest of the world may well prove to be bit players, relatively inconsequential in comparison to these major players, of the Middle East.

[9:41] Here, it all began. This, we know for certain. And here, it will all end. We know this for certain also.

[9:53] All that is lacking is the preciseness of the timetable, which we are not privy to. God's historic dealings with all these factors has been very forthright and physical.

[10:08] Great physical aspects were involved between God and these ancient players of the past. They will return in a very physical way in the end time.

[10:20] And, what do we mean by physical? By that, I mean the manner in which God dealt with these patriarchs and related to them and communicated with them on a basis that is completely unlike anything that we experience today.

[10:37] And, it is important to note that it is because of this, shall I say, routine way in which God interacted with his ancient people that they have come to kind of expect that.

[10:49] And, we wonder why it isn't this way today. Because, it isn't this way today. For instance, when God approached our first parents in what I believe was a Christophany, and I won't go into the ramifications of a Christophany as opposed to a Theophany, but we've explained that in the past.

[11:12] It was a very physical thing. When God created Adam from the dust of the earth, that was physical earth. And, he made a physical being.

[11:24] And, this Christophany seems to have had a physical appearance that related to Adam and Eve on a very personal kind of level, much the same way I am able to relate to you.

[11:39] We are told that God walked with Adam and Eve in the cool of a garden. I don't think that means that he was a voice out of the blue or communicated some such way like that.

[11:54] It appears to have been very much physical and very much face to face. And, when God communicated with with Cain, I think that too was a very physical thing and a face to face confrontation.

[12:17] Kind of like Cain, where is Abel? How should I know? Am I my brother's keeper? And, that seems to have been a face to face kind of connection that God had with them.

[12:33] And, I think we find the same thing when he appears to Abraham many years later in connection with Abraham dwelling by the plains of Mamre.

[12:44] And, these three individuals approached him in the noonday sun. And, one of them was the angel of Jehovah. and the other two were angelic beings who were on their way to conduct a mission of destroying Sodom and Gomorrah.

[13:03] And, Abraham communicated with this Christophany in a very physical, personal way. Moses is said to have spoken with God face to face.

[13:15] can't imagine something like that. And, we know that there was a time when he said no one could look upon him and Moses was hidden in the cleft of the rock and God passed by and his hinder parts were seen.

[13:31] We don't understand that. But, we do know one thing. It was absolutely awesome and mind-boggling. We cannot begin to appreciate that. Joshua had an encounter at the Brook Jabbok with the angel of Jehovah.

[13:50] And, that too appears to have been a Christophany. And, I don't understand at all the full outcome of that confrontation, but it was significant. And, Jacob's name was changed to Israel.

[14:07] And, Jacob became Israel. And, he is thereafter referred to in the Bible as Israel and also as Jacob. And, this confrontation, which was about as physical as it could be, and I cannot get my brain around this wrestling match that took place, but I know that Jacob was left with a reminder of that wrestling match for the rest of his life because he was forced to walk with a limp.

[14:36] And, that's about as physical as you can get. God. And, when Moses was called of God to go and see to it that the children of Israel would be released from Pharaoh in slavery, God called to him out of a physical burning bush.

[14:56] He's got all of these physical apparatus that's involved in the Old Testament that we do not see nearly on that plane in the New Testament.

[15:07] Israel learned early on that God was a God of miracles and these miracles almost always involved the physical something that you could look at and see.

[15:21] There it is. And, perhaps, nowhere else is that demonstrated so vividly as in the contest with Moses and Pharaoh and Pharaoh's magicians and all of these miracles that were plagues actually.

[15:38] I mean, everything from lice and frogs and water turning to blood and you name it. But they were all physical and everything, everybody could see, the Egyptians.

[15:49] And then, of course, the last one was perhaps the most physical at all because it involved physical death. It was the death of all of the firstborn of Egypt.

[16:01] And the only ones exempted, the children of Israel that had the blood applied on the lentils of the doorpost and when the death angel came by, he passed over them.

[16:13] Hence, the institution of the Jewish feast called the Passover. And you couldn't get more physical than that. It was physical blood that they applied on the physical doorpost and lentil and people died physically.

[16:29] And how physical was the manna from heaven that they ate? And how physical was the water that came out of the rock? And how physical was miraculous deliverances one after another?

[16:41] How physical was the walls of Jericho come falling down? And the crossing of the Jordan River when the priests set foot on the water with the ark and the waters dried up and the children of Israel crossed over on dry land.

[16:58] Much like they crossed the Red Sea on dry land when the Egyptian army was inundated. All of these things are physical. Hey, is it any wonder, is it any wonder that Israel seeks after a sign?

[17:16] God brought them up to look for signs, to be accustomed to signs, to expect signs. And they were in abundance, just one grand bailout after another.

[17:27] God came to their rescue. And then when we come into the New Testament and approach the Gospels, what do we find?

[17:38] More of the same. What were the miracles that Jesus performed? Virtually every one of them had a note of materiality, physicality about it.

[17:51] Healing of somebody being blind, that's pretty physical. Raising someone from the dead is pretty physical. Casting demons out of someone, well, now that's kind of spiritual there, no doubt about that, because demons are not physical beings, but that person out of whom those demons were cast by Christ, they were a physical person, and the water into wine was physical water and physical wine.

[18:22] And we find all of this physicality. Actually, the miracles that Jesus performed were not as a lot of people think, and as a lot of so-called healers teach today, that Jesus performed all those miracles because he felt sorry for people who were inundated with physical illnesses and so on, and I'm sure he did.

[18:46] There's no question that the Son of God had more compassion on people who were hurting than anybody else, but that wasn't the principal reason for him performing those miracles.

[18:57] The principal reason he did was to back up the claim that he was who he said he was. And if you are the Son of God, you ought to be able to show us some pizzazz.

[19:13] What have you got to show for yourself if you're really who you say you are? And Christ did so many miracles, but you know what? It didn't have the desired effect.

[19:25] And that just kind of overwhelms me. I ask myself time and time again, how in the world could these people, with their own eyes, see what Jesus did and not believe in him, and not commit themselves to him?

[19:47] How is that possible? And the only answer that I can come to is that the depths of the human heart and its commitment to sin is such that man's unbelief is not due to a lack of evidence.

[20:08] His unbelief is due to a lack of will. will. He doesn't want to believe. Because the implications of that, something that he can't abide by.

[20:21] Because if he believes, he puts himself under a new master and a new lord. A man likes to be in the driver's seat. He likes to call the shots. This is systemic to human nature.

[20:34] It's the self-centeredness that we all suffer from and is part of the fall. It's a very integral part of the fall, this self-centeredness thing. So, it got to the place, it got to the place where they would demand of Jesus, what signs show us thou?

[20:55] Show us, show us, and finally, you get the impression that Jesus just kind of got fed up and said, enough of the signs.

[21:06] There shall no sign be given to this adulterous generation except the sign of Noah, except the sign of Jonah, for Jonah was in the belly of the great fish for three days, so must the Son of Man be in the heart.

[21:24] That was the resurrection that he was talking of, and he was telling them, you people have had multiple signs, and what good is it done? All you do is demand another.

[21:36] And there were occasions when he chided his own people by saying, woe, woe unto you, Chorazin, Bethsaida. These were coastal villages.

[21:50] Peter the apostle's hometown was there in Bethsaida, and Capernaum, where Jesus visited frequently, and the ancient ruins of the synagogue in Capernaum to this very day is probably the only place where you can walk on those cobblestones in the remains of that synagogue and be reasonably certain you are really walking on the very cobblestones that Jesus Christ walked on 2,000 years ago.

[22:18] That's about the only place in Israel where you can say that. And he went on to chide those people, and he said, if the mighty miracles done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented, but not you.

[22:41] What was so significant about Tyre and Sidon? They weren't Jewish. They were Gentiles. They were a bunch of pagans, a bunch of heathen.

[22:52] Yet Jesus is saying, you know what? I would have to give them more credit than you because if I had done in you, in them, what I have done in you, it would have been enough for them, but it isn't for you.

[23:05] There's never enough. See, you can never give enough evidence to convince anyone who is committed to unbelief. But one of the most poignant anecdotes that I've ever heard was that given by a senior moment.

[23:29] Bernard who? No, no, no, no, not a current one.

[23:40] This was a, I can't even think of his name. Anyway, it'll come to me when I'm thinking of something else. He was asked a question. Should the time come when you stand before your maker and he asks you why you didn't believe?

[24:03] Bertrand Russell, great philosopher, great thinker, great mind, great intellect, no question about it. Bertrand Russell. And God asked you why you didn't believe.

[24:15] What would you tell him? And he said, I would tell him, you didn't give me enough evidence. Now, here is a man, as great an intellect as he was, who was thoroughly self-deceived.

[24:31] His problem was a lack of evidence. His problem was a lack of will. And so it is with many who come to confront these spiritual issues.

[24:43] Man prefers darkness rather than light. and will not come to the light lest his evil deeds be reproved. And the only thing that can overcome that is persistent and consistent penetrations of light that comes with the gospel.

[25:01] It's the only thing that can overcome that. Because it involves satanic blindness as well. Like Paul said, if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost, whose minds the God of this age the God of this world has blinded, lest or so that or unless the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, which is the image of God, should shine unto them.

[25:32] So all of this abundance of miracles that God performed for the children of Israel in the Old Testament. And by the way, what was the most significant thing for which he condemned them?

[25:45] despite all of those miracles, what was their big hang-up? Unbelief. Are you kidding me?

[25:58] After all of these miracles, God says, I took care of you and I fed you and I gave you water to drink in the desert and I put sandals on your feet for 40 years and didn't wear out.

[26:11] and all they could say was, yeah, but what have you done for us lately? Give me a break. And then when he told them, when they reached, I think it was Kurgatharba, close, close to the border of the promised land, and all they had to do was go in and take it and that's what they were supposed to do.

[26:38] And some brilliant thinker came up with the idea, now wait a minute. We can't just go in there willy-nilly roughshod.

[26:50] We've got to have some reconnaissance. We've got to find out who these people are and how strong they are and how their fortresses can be penetrated or whatnot.

[27:00] So we send out the 12 spies. And you know the story. The 10 came back with a negative report. These guys are big. The men are tough. And they're well-trained.

[27:11] And I've never seen weapons like these guys have got. Frankly, we don't stand a chance against these guys. Joshua and Caleb, two loners, came back.

[27:26] I don't know who it was that was carrying the grapes of Escal. I've seen a picture of that and it's kind of neat. But they were bringing these grapes of Escal back as a testimony.

[27:36] as a witness to the people and the artist's conception shows these two guys carrying a huge bunch of grapes on a long pole.

[27:50] And one of them has one end of the pole on his shoulder. The other has the end of the pole on his other shoulder. And there's this big bunch of grapes in the middle. And they're called the grapes of Escal.

[28:01] And they're saying this is the land of milk and honey. Let me show you. Let me show you what they're growing over there. Look at these things, would you? And the people were not enticed.

[28:13] And Joshua and Caleb says, yeah, yeah, they've got big fortresses. Yeah, they've got some armor and they've got armament and they've got weapons that we don't have and they've got all kinds of stuff.

[28:25] But we've got the Lord. That's all we need. And you would have thought that there would have been a rally and cry and everybody would have said, right, right, yeah, let's go.

[28:41] No. Because everybody knows that the majority is always right. Right? And they listen to the majority report. And you know, that was kind of like the last straw for God.

[28:56] He says, all right, that's it. You won't go into the land? You're not going into the land. Your carcass is going to drop right here in the wilderness and all you're going to do is walk around in circles until every last one of you of this generation dies off.

[29:12] It's going to take you 38 years, but I'm in no hurry. And that's exactly what they did. They wandered in the wilderness for 38 years and only two people of that whole aggregate body that came out of Egypt would go into the promised land.

[29:28] that was Joshua and Caleb. And not even Moses got there. That's another story, but he's buried on Mount Nebo.

[29:40] He's the only person in all of the Bible of whom it is said that God buried him on Mount Nebo. So you know what?

[29:51] My conclusion about all of this stuff is miracles. The miracles don't make that much difference. The physical seeing is believing thing doesn't make that much difference.

[30:05] It didn't to them. And they saw one right after another. I mean, it was just amazing. How could they possibly turn their back on that? But they did repeatedly.

[30:19] And I think one of those reasons is because, you know, we tend to have a real short memory. We do forget things very easily.

[30:31] And it's because of our forgetfulness that the Lord told the Israelites back in Deuteronomy 6, listen, he says, all of these things you hold dear in the law and the practices and everything, and what you need to do is you need to instill this in your children.

[30:50] You teach your sons and daughters these truths from their uprising to their down-sitting and you inculcate this information in them because if you don't, it'll all be lost.

[31:01] And you know what's happened? It's all lost. All it takes is for one generation, one generation to drop the ball. That's all it takes. And the next generation goes off on a different path.

[31:15] Folks, that's where we are today. We've done the same thing that Israel has done. We haven't taught our children, previous generations, as we should have, and God knows it hasn't been taught in the public schools, anything regarding valuable history.

[31:37] It is amazing how dumb these kids are about history. couldn't name the first three presidents, some of them, if their life depended on it. It's pathetic.

[31:50] But that's par for the course with what's going on today in public education. Well, all of this miracle stuff is not cutting it.

[32:02] So, what's God going to do? Now, I don't believe for a moment that God said, well, I'll try, I tried that and it didn't work.

[32:15] It's time for me to try something. God doesn't have any plan B's. God just has one plan, and that's his plan, and he plans his work, and he works his plan, and all things come together after the counsel of his own will, and I'm satisfied that when the big wrap-up occurs and everything is said and done, God is going to be able to look upon it all and say, you know what?

[32:36] It turned out just like I planned. He's not going to have any surprises, but he is changing his methodology, and it isn't any longer focusing on the physical and the miracles.

[32:52] In the Old Testament, everything is physical. The land is physical. The promise is a physical kingdom. Israel, the center of it, physical throne, throne of David, all physical, all physical.

[33:06] But when you get into the New Testament, the book of Acts starts out that way. That's very physical. We've got miracles. Chapter 2, well actually chapter 1 with the ascension of Christ, that's pretty physical.

[33:23] He stands there and ascends bodily right in front of them. That's another miracle. It's called the ascension. And then the arrival of the Spirit of God and everyone is speaking languages that they did not know and had not learned.

[33:41] And this rushing mighty wind that came in, that too is all physical. And Peter and John healing the man who was lame from his mother's womb at the temple gate, beautiful, in Acts chapter 3.

[33:55] That's a very physical thing. This guy had two good physical legs. He's stomping around and looking at him and jumping up and down. He grabs Peter and hugs him and he grabs a John and hugs him and everybody's standing there and saying, what is this?

[34:07] What is this? What's going on? I'll tell you what's going on. It's another sign. And God is extending his mercy to the nation of Israel there in that physical temple and that site.

[34:23] And then there are some miraculous physical releases from prison where they are all bound up and tied up and God sends an angel and opens the doors and Peter and John are gone and they go out and preach to the people again.

[34:36] And then to move on through the Acts, something starts changing. What's changing anyway?

[34:48] What's happening? There is a transition that is moving from God using the physical for emphasis to God using the spiritual and non-physical.

[35:08] In some ways that's not as easy to grasp as the physical. And I think this is what Paul means when he says, we walk by faith, not by sight.

[35:24] faith. What did he mean by that? He meant that hitherto up to this point in time, God has demonstrated and worked with and shown Israel his plan and program through all of these physical material things that they could not deny because seeing is believing.

[35:44] And there was no dispute about that. But now that's changing. we are not to be walking by sight, but by faith.

[35:58] What that boils down to is this. Our focus is not to be on the material or in demanding the material. Our focus is to be on the non-material and the spiritual.

[36:15] That's walking by faith, not by sight. we are not to believe God because of what we see. That's what Thomas was locked into.

[36:28] I'm not going to believe unless I can see the prince and the nails in his hands and put my hand into his side. I won't believe. And later when he did that very thing or had the opportunity to, Jesus said, Thomas, because, because, you have seen me.

[36:50] You have believed. And that's what it took for you. Because you wouldn't believe by faith. You wouldn't believe just by being told. You had to see for yourself. Blessed are they who having not seen shall believe.

[37:08] And I think he was talking about way in the future and it involves us. Because I don't know about you. But I haven't seen the Lord. I haven't seen him.

[37:22] I don't expect to see him until he shows himself. But he hasn't shown himself yet. I know some people talk about Jesus sitting on their bedside, but he's never sat on mine.

[37:34] And yet, why do we believe? We believe because of this thing called faith. And faith, faith is not the ability to muster up something and believe something because you hope, you hope, you hope that it's true.

[37:52] Faith is not like the little first grader who defined it when his teacher, Sunday school teacher asked him, can you tell me what faith is? And he says, sure, faith is believing something that you know isn't so.

[38:05] That is not faith. That is stupidity. That's incredulity. faith that we are called upon to exercise is faith that has confidence and trust in good, abundant, reliable information.

[38:23] There are credible witnesses who had no motive for lying and certainly had no interest in dying for something that they knew was not true.

[38:36] God has given us sufficient evidence and Bertrand Russell probably already knows that by now. So what we've got here in the Bible, we've got a movement from an Old Testament scene where God is dealing with his covenant chosen people in a special way with all of these physical miracles and physical appearances to a complete kind of reversal later on in the New Testament.

[39:08] And as you move through the book of Acts, you know what you find? You find the physical miracles disappearing. They're fading away. What's happening? That program is coming to an end.

[39:24] It's being set aside. There is a whole new thing that is coming into focus that is removed from the Jew and the physical and it embraces the Jew and the Gentile in the spiritual.

[39:43] And yes, God still does physical miracles today whenever he wants, however he wants, or whomever he wants, but he doesn't do it like he did.

[39:54] You know, when Jesus was here and in the Old Testament, the physical miracles were standard operating procedure. Today, they are definitely not.

[40:07] What does God want today? He wants you to believe him simply because he says it's so, and that's all the evidence you need. Your confidence is in who God is and what he has said, what he has revealed.

[40:22] That's what it means to walk by faith, not by sight. I do not believe God because he has done any physical miracles for me at all.

[40:34] I believe him simply because he is worthy of being believed because of who he is and what he's done and what he's revealed in this book. And that's all we need.

[40:47] That's all we need. That's plenty. That's more than enough. It's an amazing, abundant revelation that he's given. So, what I want you to keep in mind is where we are going with this because we are going to be moving.

[41:02] We're not finished with the Jew yet. We've still got some things that you need to know about the Jew because these people, these people have suffered and endured treatment, abuse, persecution that is absolutely indescribable.

[41:23] And we're going to be giving you just a taste of it, but you've already had some exposure with the Holocaust and stuff like that. But most people, most Gentiles have no idea what the Jewish people have gone through and why it is that they have gone through it.

[41:41] And I just want to close with this because it's becoming more and more, I think, apparent. And that is the hatred, the animosity, the venom that is spewed out on the Jewish people down through the centuries and is surfacing dramatically today, is nothing more than satanically energized and motivated.

[42:10] The adversary is behind a lot of this. There is no logical reason for the Jew being the brunt of persecution that they have been without the influence of his infernal majesty, Satan himself.

[42:28] And, of course, in the end time, which we'll be looking at in Revelation, he plays a very significant and obvious role, and that will be upcoming.

[42:41] So, all I want you to take home from this is an appreciation that what we have got is a plan and program of God developing, unfolding. We've got doctrine on the move.

[42:51] We've got progressive revelation. And it is no coincidence that God used 1,500 years to give us the Bible from beginning to end rather than just dropping it down from heaven so we've got it all at once.

[43:09] It's 1,500 years of development and progress and movement and changes and transitions. And if you do not see the transition that is involved, particularly in the New Testament, from things away that are strictly, purely, totally Jewish into things that are Jew and Gentile together in one body, this new thing called the church, if you don't see that concept developing, you're going to shortchange yourself for a whole lot of understanding of the Bible.

[43:45] and I'm excited because I know what this has done for my own personal study and appreciation of the Bible and it just makes it jump alive. It's incredible. This thing, this thing is for real.

[44:00] It's for real. And what is happening today is going to culminate in just exactly what this book says it is. And we are in for one whale of a ride.

[44:14] And you know what? I have mixed feelings about this because, and I tell you this of a truth, I tell you this of a truth, it may occur before we get to it.

[44:26] And that concerns me a little. But even if it does, it'll be God's timetable and there can't be anything wrong with that. So I can't say, Lord, you've got to hold off things until I get through teaching these people what they need to know.

[44:40] Doesn't that sound kind of stupid? Well, it would be kind of stupid too. So anyway, we are in for something. And stand with me if you would, please. And then I want you to be seated again, but I want to pray for you.

[44:54] Thank you, Father, for this time and for whatever enlightenment we're able to glean from this. We see the sovereign hand of our Lord behind all of these things that are unfolding in the Bible and outside of the Bible.

[45:09] And so much of it we cannot comprehend and do not understand. But we know you do. And that's all that really matters. Thank you for being the loving, benevolent God that you are.

[45:20] Thank you for the patience you have with the sons of men. Thank you for what you are pleased to reveal now and later as we investigate it together. In Christ's name. Amen.

[45:31] I want you to be seated for just a moment. I want to close with a musical benediction. It's a wonderful message from someone we came to appreciate, Marty Goetz, and you'll like the emphasis that he places on that.

[45:46] And then you will be dismissed. please. Please. my life goes on in endless song above earth's lamentation.

[46:22] I hear the ring, though far off here, that hails a new creation. no storm can shake my inmost calm while to that rock I'm clinging.

[46:44] Since love is Lord of heaven and earth, how can I keep from singing?

[46:59] Through all the tumult and the strike, I hear its music ringing. It sounds an echo in my soul.

[47:16] How can I keep from singing? No storm can shake my inmost calm while to that rock I'm clinging.

[47:31] in, since love is Lord of heaven and earth, how can I keep from singing?

[47:43] while to the tempest lovely voice I hear the truth be delivered and though the darkness round me close songs in the night it gives no storm can shake my inmost heart while to that rock I'm clean since love is Lord of Heaven and Earth how can I keep from singing no storm can shake my inmost heart while to that rock I'm clean since love is

[49:05] Lord of Heaven and Earth how can I keep from singing when love is Lord of Heaven and Earth how can I keep from singing etcetera it is the endless year