The Jewish Final Solution to the World's Problem - From Jew To Gentile, Part 1

[0:00] We continue with this really very critical content in the book of Acts that depicts a transition which, if not understood as such and the purpose behind it, great confusion will result in the interpretation of the scriptures.

[0:17] I would remind you of a verse that the apostle used in 1 Corinthians 10.30 when he talked about giving none offense to the Jew or the Gentile or the church of God.

[0:36] Those three categories comprise the totality of humanity, and everybody fits into one or more of those.

[0:47] If you were, during the first century, a Jew, or if you are a Jew today, you are a direct descendant of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

[0:59] You comprise two-tenths of one percent of the world's population. Everyone who is not a Jew is a Gentile. That's the balance.

[1:12] Ninety-nine percent of the world's population. Most all of us, probably all of us, are Gentiles. But there is a third category that is important to understand because it consists of Jews and Gentiles together in one aggregate body.

[1:36] And they are referred to as the church, which is his body. That is the body of Christ, the spiritual body of Christ. And every believer belongs to it.

[1:49] So in his reference there in 1 Corinthians 10.30, he is delineating and explaining the three different categories of humanity. We are trying to give very careful attention to a singular document of transition.

[2:06] Because it alone reveals the transition from Jew to Gentile to church of God.

[2:18] Because as the book of Acts opens, it's thoroughly Jewish. Totally Jewish. Exclusively Jewish. And it is really a continuation and a carryover of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John.

[2:34] They are exclusively Jewish. Although there are a few references to different Gentiles like the Syrophoenician woman and the Canaanite woman and several like that.

[2:47] But they are all individuals. And the vast majority of those people involved in the Gospels are the same as those people involved in the Old Testament.

[2:58] They are Jews. So the Gospels are Jews. The early chapters of the book of Acts are Jews. Jews. Jews. All seed of Abraham.

[3:10] The transition begins when there is movement from Jew to... Well, not completely Gentile, not completely Jew, but we've got a little bit of a mix here.

[3:28] And what I'm thinking about is when you get into Acts chapter 8, which we will look at earlier, later, not earlier.

[3:39] We didn't look at it. No, we didn't. We haven't been there before. We didn't look at it earlier. We'll look at it later. Okay. But you have a very strategic person just kind of sandwiched in there.

[3:52] And he is the Ethiopian eunuch. Where did he come from? Well, he came from Ethiopia. Where was he? He had been in Jerusalem. What was he doing in Jerusalem?

[4:04] He was in Jerusalem to worship. But now, wait a minute. How can an Ethiopian be a Jew? Because Ethiopians are very dark-skinned.

[4:19] They are black. They are among some of the blackest of the black race. How could they be Jewish? And the answer takes you all the way back to the Queen of Sheba who visited with Solomon.

[4:33] And the plot thickens. And suffice it to say, not long ago, as late as the 1990s, there was a large number of Ethiopian black Jews that applied for Aliyah.

[4:54] That is, under the law of return, they applied to the Israeli government for permission to migrate to Israel. And the Jewish officials scratched their head and says, these people want to migrate.

[5:10] They want Aliyah, which in Hebrew means the return. They want to come to Israel. Well, they're not Jews. They wouldn't be welcome. Well, you know what?

[5:21] They did some DNA blood tests and guess what they found? Jewish blood in those black Ethiopians. They had been practicing Judaism for hundreds of years in Ethiopia.

[5:35] Keeping the Sabbath kosher food and all the rest of it. So what the Israelis did, they took one of those big 747s and took all the seats out of it.

[5:50] And made all of this huge amount of floor space. Flew it down to Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. And loaded it up with Ethiopian Jews who wanted to migrate to Israel.

[6:03] Brought back a whole plane load of them. There were several hundred. And they're there today being incorporated into Jewish society. So this Ethiopian eunuch was a proselyte.

[6:18] He was not a biological child of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But he was a proselyte. And what that meant was he had been a Gentile.

[6:32] And now he is a bona fide Jew. Many of you are familiar with a well-known entertainer who has since passed off the scene.

[6:42] But he was one of the most talented guys that Hollywood ever saw. His name was Sammy Davis, Jr. He was a proselyte. He had gone through all of the training, etc.

[6:56] And had become Jewish. I don't know if he was circumcised or not. He probably was. If you're going to be a bona fide Jew and accepted by the Jewish people, you have to be circumcised.

[7:07] So all I'm saying is we're moving from purely Jewish to, well, he wasn't born a Jew, but he is a proselyte.

[7:18] And then when you move on to Acts chapter 10, who surfaces but another Gentile with deep sympathies for Israel.

[7:29] His name is Cornelius. And he's not a proselyte in that he didn't go through all of the ritual, including circumcision. But he is called a God-fearer.

[7:39] A God-fearer is a Gentile who respects and believes in the God of Israel as opposed to all of the pagan deities that the Romans believed in. Cornelius was one who was convinced that the God of Israel was the one true God.

[7:54] And he demonstrated his confidence and faith in this one true God by giving money to Jewish causes and by praying. And you know the story in Acts 10, how Peter was sent to answer his prayer and give him the information that he needed.

[8:12] So what we've got is a transition from a purely Jewish situation to a proselyte in chapter 8. And chapter 10, we've got a God-fearer.

[8:26] And the thing that is so striking about these is that they were not bona fide Jews. You couldn't call them half-breed. They weren't half-Jew and half-Gentile.

[8:37] But they did not have a pure Jewish background. That's the point I'm making. And then, one chapter earlier, chapter 9, we have the arrival of Paul the Apostle on the scene, who had been Saul of Tarsus.

[8:58] And he is raised up to be what? The Apostle to the Gentiles. Wow. So we've got an enormous change that is taking place.

[9:12] And if you don't recognize the movement from Jew, and then because of their rejection of the Messiah, God turns to the Gentile.

[9:24] And Paul, in addressing Jewish brethren, said to them, seeing as hell, you regard yourselves as unworthy of eternal life?

[9:39] You don't want anything to do with this gospel that I'm preaching about Jesus being the Messiah? Okay. If that's your decision, that's your decision. Lo! We turn to the Gentiles.

[9:51] And they will hear it. And that, of course, is exactly what happened. And the emphasis became more and more Gentile, less and less Jewish.

[10:04] That is also by design. Because, as Romans chapter 11 informs us, it is through the rejection of Israel that God brought the Gentiles on board.

[10:20] And this is referred to as a mystery. No one would have ever dreamt this in a thousand years. It is just sprung upon humanity without any pre-planning, without any prediction, without any prophesying, without any warning.

[10:39] It's just everything moves to the Gentiles. And now, the synagogue, the temple, they are all passe, set aside, and an entirely different order comes into being.

[10:52] And it is called the church, which is the spiritual body of Christ. And it is made up of Jews and Gentiles who have personally professed faith in Jesus Christ as their Messiah and Savior.

[11:11] Book of Acts. Highly transitional. And if you don't see the progress of doctrine and the development that took place over a period of 30 years, you can read those 28 chapters in probably 30 minutes, but it took 30 years to live those.

[11:30] And if you fail to see that, then you're going to have the confusion. Frankly, you're going to have the confusion that we have in our world today, which is precisely the reason why we have so many different denominations and religious groups.

[11:47] It is all in how you interpret the scriptures as to whether you will be Presbyterian or Methodist or Baptist or Church of God or Reformed or whatever.

[11:59] It's all in how you approach the scriptures. That's what's responsible for these different groups. So, we are giving careful attention to this rejection and to the progression of doctrine.

[12:12] The 12 apostles have begun preaching something that was totally foreign to what the Jewish religious establishment had been practicing for hundreds of years.

[12:24] And that was what? That was the death, burial, and resurrection of the Messiah. That had never been part of the program. That had never been announced.

[12:34] That had never been talked about. Never been imagined. And now, this is their central message. This is what they're proclaiming. And, no doubt, the religious establishment of Israel could listen to the death, burial, and resurrection of Christ and say, well, where does that fit in with the law of Moses?

[12:53] That's not part of the law. That's not what we're supposed to be about. Oh, yes it was. Because Moses and all of the prophets spoke ultimately of this one who was to come and what he would be able to accomplish.

[13:05] Their teaching was considered to be contrary to the law of Moses that had been their governance in every area of life.

[13:16] And the twelve were viewed as a dangerous threat to the established order of Judaism. Conflict was inevitable.

[13:29] inevitable. Because when you have an irresistible force and an immovable object clash, you've got a stalemate where neither one will give.

[13:42] And the force, the irresistible force on the part of the twelve was this gospel that they were preaching. And they could not hold their peace.

[13:55] They absolutely had to give out this message. They were commissioned to. It was a message of life. It was a message from God. And that which provided the other half and resisted was the established order.

[14:13] And you know, it has always been that way. You look back to all of the Old Testament prophets. I care not whether you're talking about Elijah, Elisha, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, all of the minor prophets, every one of them without exception, preached truth the people did not want to hear.

[14:38] And the authorities would not abide. no prophet has ever been raised up of God to just give the people good news.

[14:50] Keep them happy. Keep them satisfied. Tell them what they want to hear. That way you keep the peace. You keep everybody okay. But when you start preaching and teaching a message that conflicts with what people already want or with what people believe, you're going to run into opposition.

[15:15] In fact, there were many cases where the opposition was so severe it cost them their life just for preaching it. That was part of the risk you undertook when you put on the mantle of a prophet.

[15:33] When God raised up Jeremiah and gave him the message to preach to Jerusalem and its environs, he added to Jeremiah's message, oh, by the way Jeremiah, when you deliver this message, they're not going to buy it.

[15:53] I just wanted to warn you up front, you will not be successful with your audience. Now, how would you like them apples?

[16:07] I can't imagine what it would be like to come to this pulpit with the realization that most of the people out there who hear what I have to say aren't going to agree with it all.

[16:18] In fact, they're going to oppose it. Boy, you talk about taking the wind out of your sails. Take the spunk out of your backbone. But I have reason to believe that I'm preaching to the choir for the most part.

[16:37] I'm preaching to a friendly, receptive audience. Oh, I accept the fact that there may well be exceptions. There may be somebody sitting out there right now saying, I wish this guy would quit just about right now, but you're not going to get your wish because I'm not going to do that.

[16:56] But I realize that there are seeds of discontent everywhere, and it's likely that this is no different anywhere you get an audience like that. But all I'm saying is this, wherever the prophets delivered the truth of God, they were never appreciated nor well received.

[17:13] And if they ever were, it was always with the common people, but never with the establishment that had more to lose by way of power, influence, and prestige.

[17:27] They were the ones who always fought. They fought the prophets, they fought our Lord, they fought the baptism, John the Baptist, and they fought the twelve. And they're going to kill Stephen, and they're going to kill John, and they're going to exile the other John.

[17:42] So this is par for the course. And the reason for this is because the way society lives, the way people conduct their lives, is simply contrary to the plan and program of God.

[17:55] And the reason it is, is because they are fallen people living in a fallen world. So the message that we are given to preach is that which brings people out of their fallenness into new life.

[18:10] But, for the most part, they oppose that against themselves, and it's against their own best interests to do that. But this is the way it is.

[18:21] And the reason they do is because in our fallenness, we love our sin. Men love darkness rather than light, and will not come to the light lest their evil deeds be reproved.

[18:38] This is John's gospel, chapter one. This is the picture of a fallen humanity. And the prophet and the preacher is called to inform people of what their true condition is, undone, separated from God, sinners all, and invite them to put their trust and faith in Jesus Christ.

[18:56] And most people get mad before they get saved, because they are offended and they don't like the message, and they think the preacher is being judgmental or putting them down, and I'm not that bad, I'm a nice guy basically, and blah, blah, blah.

[19:11] And that's the way it is. That's the picture of humanity. So the twelve have this message to deliver, and it centers around the person and work of Jesus Christ. And if you would turn, please, for quick reference to Acts, chapter five.

[19:26] I just want to remind you with a few verses here. Acts, chapter five, and verse 17. But the high priest rose up. Who's this? This is the establishment.

[19:38] Shakers and movers. High priest rose up along with all his associates. That's this installed body of authority, religious authority in Israel.

[19:52] temple. It's a sect of the Sadducees, and they were filled with jealousy. And they laid hands on the apostles and put them in a public jail.

[20:03] But an angel of the Lord, during the night, opened the gates of the prison, and taking them out, he said, I love this, go your way.

[20:16] Stand and speak to the people in the temple the whole message of this life. Wow. What a commission.

[20:27] They've already received one from the Lord. Now it's being reinforced by the angel who supernaturally released them from jail and said, go to the temple, that's where you're going to find all the people.

[20:38] Go to the temple and give them this same message. message for which they had been put in prison. And upon hearing this, they entered into the temple about daybreak.

[20:51] First thing in the morning, first light, just as the priests start showing up for the early morning sacrifice and the people begin to gather. And you could look out there and see the gates of the temple and people start flooding in.

[21:05] And here are the twelve waiting for them with this message to deliver. And they began to teach. Now, when the high priest and his associates, this is the same guy in verse 17, had come, they called the council, this is the Sanhedrin together, even all the senate of the sons of Israel.

[21:27] These are the big shots. These are the equivalent of our senators and representatives, if you will, in the legislative branch. And they sent orders to the prison house for them to be brought.

[21:41] The only problem is, of course, they're not there. The angel had already broken them out of jail. And these guys come back and say, we found the prison house locked securely, the guards standing at the doors, but when we'd open up, no one's inside.

[21:55] Place is still locked up and the guards are still outside the cells, but there's nobody in the cells. What's going on here anyway? Well, of course, they didn't realize what had happened. And they told them, and in verse 25, someone came, somebody comes running up to them and says, you'll never believe where these guys are and what they're doing.

[22:14] Hey, they're in the temple. They're right back at it again. After you warned them and told them, put them in jail, told them not to free, they're back, they're in the temple, they're doing the very same thing again. These guys, what's going on here?

[22:25] How did they get out? They're all confused. And they questioned them. And in verse 28, we gave you strict orders not to continue teaching in this name.

[22:40] Behold, you have filled Jerusalem with your teaching and intend to bring this man's blood upon us. That means they are saying, you are accusing us of being guilty of the blood of Jesus of Nazareth.

[22:53] Well, the truth of the matter is, they were. They were as guilty as you they were as guilty as Judas. They were as guilty as the guards that carried it out. They were as guilty as everybody who had a hand in it.

[23:07] They were as guilty as Pontius Pilate. It's a shared guilt. But Peter, verse 29, Peter and the apostles answered and said, we must obey God rather than men.

[23:26] That's it. That's the whole bottom line of civil disobedience. It is responding and being obedient to the higher power rather than to man's power.

[23:39] Many people today, even Christians, do not understand exactly what is involved here. But it is a very, very important concept. Civil disobedience became a necessity in order to preach the gospel.

[23:54] people. If you're going to preach the gospel in a hostile climate, you have to do it to people and four people who will not appreciate it and may even make it illegal for you to do that.

[24:13] Now, we've got a great conflict that is underfoot right now in this nation. And it has to do with the First Amendment that is at the heart of it.

[24:25] It is the freedom of speech. And our forefathers held that so sacred and so important, they led with it.

[24:40] It's called the First Amendment. And everything else is going to flow from that. And if you don't have freedom of speech, you will not and you cannot have liberty.

[24:54] It's an impossibility. If you have to guard your words because you are afraid of what the government will say or for what the government will do to you for speaking your mind, your freedom has gone right down the tubes.

[25:13] Our forefathers knew that. Where do you think this thing was birthed? It was birthed in their minds and hearts because of the oppression that the colonies were under by the throne of England.

[25:29] And there and here it was regarded treasonous to speak against the king. The equivalent would be in this country, it would be treasonous to criticize the president.

[25:46] You would not have that right. And if you insist on doing it, you could go to jail. That means you don't have freedom of speech. Now, as you well understand, freedom of speech has its limitations.

[26:01] The classic example has been given, I think it was by one of the Supreme Court justices, says, freedom of speech does not give you the right to shout fire in a crowded theater.

[26:13] Doesn't give you that right. That's not freedom of speech, that's just irresponsible behavior. But the moment the government censors and tells people what they can and cannot say, you are on a really slippery slope.

[26:28] And that's partly what we're dealing with right now. Aren't Christians supposed to obey the law? law?

[26:39] Absolutely. How can we disobey the law and yet be submissive to the God-ordained authority? And we've got numerous examples.

[26:51] An authority would be in the case of Joseph. When Joseph was in Potiphar's house, we're going all the way back to Genesis now. When Joseph who became leader in Egypt was in Potiphar's house and Potiphar's wife tried to seduce him, she was the authority figure.

[27:12] Joseph was a slave. He was a servant. He didn't have any clout. He didn't have any authority. And Potiphar's wife says, come, lie with me. Honey, I want to go to bed with you.

[27:26] And Joseph recognized that she was a person in authority. She was over him. She was the wife of the pharaoh. He was under her authority.

[27:41] I suppose he could have said, well, orders are orders. She wants me to go to bed with her. I've got no choice but to be obedient because I'm supposed to do what the authority says.

[27:52] Joseph knew that there was another authority and that that was the one that demanded his allegiance and he considered acquiescing to her authority to be treason against God.

[28:08] How could I sin and do this great evil against my master Potiphar and against God? And of course, he fled. And we've got other examples with Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego.

[28:21] children that would not succumb to worshipping the powers that be. And they were told that they would be put into the fiery furnace and they said, okay, you can put us into the fiery furnace and if we perish, we perish.

[28:38] If we die, we die. But we will not, we will not be treasonous against our God by obeying you. And you've got a similar situation with Daniel placed in the lion's den when the word went out that no one in the kingdom would be able to offer any prayer or any petition to anyone other than to the king whom they regarded as deity.

[29:06] And Daniel says, I can't do that. And he was of the habit of having a prayer time in his own home every day at a certain time, and there were those who laid in wait and spied on him to see if he continued to do that, and he did.

[29:21] And as a result, he was thrown into the lion's den, and you know the story, how that turned out. Got a similar situation with Esther. We have a situation like that with slavery and the abolitionists here in this country, when slavery was legal, and those who opposed slavery were looked upon as lawbreakers.

[29:48] The abolitionists were considered lawbreakers. And those people who installed and manned the Underground Railroad to make it possible for slaves escaping from the south to make it to the north and to Canada, they were all considered lawbreakers.

[30:08] Unfortunately, there was a conflict with you had slavery in the south, and you had non-slavery in the north, and that divided the nation, which of course, along with other things, contributed to the Civil War.

[30:23] So, I have an article that I want you to have, and I'm going to briefly run through it, and copies are waiting for you in the literature rack.

[30:40] Shouldn't Christians just obey the law? are you Christians supposed to be obedient to the law? Yes.

[30:51] And by the way, this ties in with the question that Gary Wade raised, and we said we would provide some further elaboration on it a week or so ago, and this article comes from the Family Policy Institute.

[31:07] If there's one thing today's secular progressive enjoys, it's telling Christians how to be Christians. If you want to know how a Christian is supposed to be, just ask somebody who isn't one.

[31:20] They'll tell you. It feels funny when it happens, a bit like getting combat training from Jane Fonda or Cindy Sheehan, but they mean well. And they know a verse.

[31:34] Their favorite verse is Matthew 7-1, which says, Judge not, lest ye also be judged. They quoted every time a Christian expresses an opinion because their years of deep theological study have shown them that Matthew 7-1 means it's wrong to have an opinion about anything.

[31:55] After all, an opinion is a judgment, and you can't do that. It says so right there. Red letters even. The urge to lecture Christians on how to be Christian is almost irresistible in the dispute over whether businesses can be forced to participate in same-sex weddings.

[32:14] I thought you were a Christian. Aren't Christians supposed to follow the law? For a moment, let's put aside the far-from-resolved debate over whether the law really does mandate involuntary servitude for same-sex weddings.

[32:29] For the purpose of this conversation, we will assume that it does. Shouldn't Christians just obey the law? law. In his letter from a Birmingham jail, Martin Luther King Jr. wrote one of the greatest commentaries ever written about what Christian citizenship requires.

[32:51] It is also instructive to remember the context in which the letter was written. It was a letter written to his fellow clergymen who were concerned about his activities.

[33:03] At the time, not everyone appreciated his demonstrations the way we do today. Do you remember what was the real linchpin of Dr. King's demonstrations?

[33:20] The real linchpin was the non-violent aspect. That meant nobody was fighting, nobody was burning buildings, nobody was turning over cars, nobody was physically combating the police.

[33:41] It was a peaceful, non-violent demonstration. And still, there were a lot of people who looked at it with a jaded eye.

[33:52] I was one of them. I seriously questioned whether they ought to be doing that. Because I saw it as fomenting unrest, and creating turmoil, and it did.

[34:07] But you can't make an improvement without making a mess. Whether you're adding a room onto your house or what. And you can't make an omelet without breaking some eggs, and that's just the way it is.

[34:23] Specifically, they expressed anxiety over Dr. King's willingness to break laws. He acknowledged the apparent contradiction in urging people to obey the Supreme Court's decision of 1954, outlawing segregation in the public schools, and demonstrating in ways that the law forbid.

[34:49] How can you advocate breaking some laws and obeying others, he was asked rhetorically. His response is instructive, both for the Christian and for those who seek to understand what motivates Christians.

[35:03] The answer lies in the fact that there are two types of laws, just and unjust. I would be the first to advocate obeying just laws.

[35:17] One has not only a legal, but a moral responsibility to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws.

[35:32] I would agree with St. Augustine that an unjust law is no law at all. So, how do we know whether a law is just or unjust?

[35:46] A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. an unjust law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law.

[36:03] To put it in terms of St. Thomas Aquinas, an unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law.

[36:15] And this is where everyone starts to get uncomfortable. Is that Martin Luther King or Jerry Falwell? Then he gives some examples.

[36:27] An unjust law is a code that a numerical or power majority group compels a minority group to obey, but does not make binding on itself.

[36:42] Congress has got a number of unjust laws in its own bosom. In that they pass legislation and make laws that are applicable to you, but not to them.

[37:00] That doesn't even begin to pass the smell test. Why should we have to be responsive to and obey laws that they don't have to?

[37:13] That's not right. Jim, tell them I said that's not right. I'm sure that will really impress them. Yeah. Well, I wonder if that would include laws that let one person decline to bake a cake with a message they disagree with, but not another person.

[37:36] Doesn't he understand that these people offend me? The left isn't going to condemn Martin Luther King any time soon because they like what he did, but their failure to appreciate or even acknowledge why he did it causes them to miss a much larger point.

[37:56] Fundamental to Christianity is the idea that there is a law higher than man's law, and that's really important.

[38:07] the compulsion to obey God regardless of what the law says is the reason the civil rights movement was a movement of Christians.

[38:18] It is the reason Quakers violated the law to be an integral part of the Underground Railroad. It is why Christians rallied against the ancient practice of exposure in which infants were set out to die immediately after birth.

[38:34] It is why Christians worked in India to eliminate the practice of burning to death widows on the funeral pyres of their husbands.

[38:45] This isn't an attempt to provide an exhaustive history of Christianity. I'm confident I don't need to remind you of the challenges the Christian church has had.

[38:56] That's what President Obama is for. But context is important. The reason Christians violated the law to free slaves, save babies from exposure, and rescue widows from funeral pyres is the same reason Christians today feel they cannot be part of a same-sex wedding ceremony.

[39:19] We are bound to a higher law. And this, by the way, is the same reasoning that convicted the Nazi war criminals and would not buy the excuse they had.

[39:33] We were just carrying out orders. And the court said, but there are orders that are higher than those that your superiors gave you. And what they were referring to was the order of natural law that everyone knew and accepted worldwide as coming from the supreme being.

[39:53] Before you start lecturing your Christian friends about why their position is actually not the Christian position, stop and ask yourself this question. Do I actually know what I'm talking about?

[40:05] If you haven't read a Bible in a year, the answer is likely no. Besides, the fact that you may not understand why someone feels something is wrong should not prohibit you from respecting their conscience anyway.

[40:19] Nevertheless, the idea that there is a law above government is not simply just a Christian idea, it is an American idea as well. the Declaration of Independence reminds us that our rights are endowed by our creator, not our government, and that governments are created to secure rights, not to create them.

[40:44] We are a constitutional republic rather than a democracy, with a bill of rights specifically because our founders understood that the majority can be wrong.

[40:59] A position that assumes a moral law exists above legislative law. Therefore, even if everyone knows I'm a terrible, horrible, very bad guy, even 99% of the public can't vote to take away my right to free speech, the free exercise of religion, or a fair trial.

[41:21] no matter how much of a scumbag someone may be, he's guaranteed those rights. And if they are denied him, what's to keep them from being denied to you?

[41:42] Your rights transcend your political popularity, and the government exists to protect those rights, not appease the mob. This structure protects us all because, as the gay lobby has so clearly demonstrated, neither political popularity nor political powerlessness are necessarily permanent conditions.

[42:04] While the right not to participate has historically been protected by the First Amendment's guarantee to the free exercise of religion, some now claim the obligation to participate is required by the duly enacted non-discrimination statute.

[42:20] The majority said you can't use religion as an excuse to discriminate. So, you can't. But the majority isn't supposed to be able to duly enact away the First Amendment.

[42:36] That's why it's the First Amendment. But again, we're assuming that none of that matters. In a world in which the law is in conflict with the Christian conscience, the response from many on the left is a cold, just obey the law.

[42:54] To which the florist responds, I will obey the law. I just won't obey your law. That's what Peter and the apostles were saying to the authorities, to the powers that be.

[43:10] We are going to obey the law. We're not going to obey your law. From his perch in heaven, to the florist who wouldn't do that flower arrangement, from his perch in heaven, Martin Luther King says, you go, girl.

[43:36] civil disobedience. It's important to note that this nation is a republic, not a democracy.

[43:53] We function under democratic principles where votes are taken and things like that. But you see, the big difference between a republic and a democracy is when you have a democracy, democracy.

[44:06] The word demos stands for the people and the okrasi stands for the rule of.

[44:18] And where you have a pure democracy, it means it is the rule of the people. And what that means is you have to have 51%.

[44:29] And when you do, that's the answer. That's the position. That's ultimate. That's the rule by the people. When you have a republic, there is an innate acknowledgement that there is an authority that transcends that of the people.

[44:50] And it is rooted in moral law and common law. And that is a recognition of the one who really gives the law and the one who really gives the orders for the carrying out of the law and sets the standards.

[45:12] That's what God has done. And it is in his word that he has done it. So all we're saying is, all the Christian is saying is, man is not the final authority.

[45:23] Yes, Romans 13 is very much in place and we are supposed to be respectful to the powers that be and we are to be submissive to the governments that are to be. But there is a huge difference between disobeying the law and not being submissive to the law.

[45:42] And they sound like they are contradictory, but they're not. And let me explain the difference as briefly as I can. When you are disobedient to the law or to the powers that be, it simply means that you will not comply.

[45:58] You will not go along with what they demand. You oppose that. You have a different standard. And when it comes to preaching the gospel, it means you will not shut up. You cannot quiet me.

[46:10] You cannot intimidate me or threaten me with whatever, because we cannot help but speak that which we know and have heard.

[46:23] and yet we are to be submissive to the powers that be in the sense that they say, okay, then we're going to put you in a fiery furnace.

[46:37] And you say, oh, no, you're not. I'm going to run. And you turn and run the other way. That's not being submissive. And that's what we're supposed to do. we are commissioned to be disobedient to the powers that be when we would have to be disobedient to God in order to be disobedient to them.

[46:57] And when they say, if you will not shut up, we're going to imprison you, we're going to put you in jail, then you need to be submissive to the powers that be, and you put out your hands so they can put the cuffs on you and lead you away to jail.

[47:13] That's being submissive to the powers that be. That's not fighting or retaliating or trying to escape punishment. You're saying, I will not be silenced, and if I have to pay a penalty for exercising what I believe I must exercise, then I'll pay the penalty.

[47:30] What is it? That's submissive to the powers that be. And at the same time, we are disobedient and will not be silenced.

[47:41] Does that help clarify? Any questions or comments? We've got a couple of minutes. Anyone? This is a real hot potato issue, and hey, you have not heard the last of this.

[47:53] It is just beginning. It's going to intensify as time goes on. And as we get closer and closer to the next election, you're probably going to hear all kinds of stuff that will be connected with this.

[48:06] any thoughts or comments anyone wants to express? In the back?

[48:25] I have always had trouble with the founders and their revolution. That was definitely a violent thing they did. They went clearly in a minority.

[48:36] but it still seemed like they did the right thing even though it doesn't seem like it. Well, I understand your concern. And you know something? Historians and scholars still argue over whether or not the Colonials or Founding Fathers took the right position.

[48:55] And very involved research over the years has pretty much demonstrated something that a lot of Americans don't know much about. But when we were engaged with in the 1700s with a great struggle with George III, the king of England, many people do not realize that here in the United States only about one-third of the people were in favor of breaking with England and establishing an independent nation.

[49:27] Only about one-third of them. And about one-third of the people were loyal to the crown and thought that the colonists had an obligation under God.

[49:40] And here's what we're talking about again, to be submissive to the powers that be. And that was the divine right of kings. And if you read the preface to the King James Bible, you get a feel for that and what was said in there.

[49:54] So there's about one-third that were for breaking away, about one-third that were insisting on being loyal to the king and they were called the loyalists or the Tories.

[50:06] And about one-third just laid back and said, I'm going to see which way this thing goes. Then I'll jump on the side that wins. And there was more push and more shove and more demand on the part of the patriots than there was on the part of the loyalists.

[50:24] And, you know, there was a lot of violence that took place back then. some of the colonists got downright ornery and even resorted to burning down some of the homes and sabotaging businesses of those who were loyal to the king.

[50:43] And then it worked the other way, too. You know, they were being pretty nasty back and forth. And some of them found the situation so hot and so unwelcome, depending on where you lived, that they actually left the country and went to Canada.

[50:58] and moved to Canada and started living there. So it's still a time that is under disagreement and scrutiny by scholars even to this day.

[51:10] Other comments? Jim? I think it's why the declaration was so important, because they spelled out the grievances.

[51:25] They showed the patience they had had trying to deal with it in any other way but the violent revolutionary way. And they listed it all out in a logical fashion.

[51:36] So this was the one time where you can, I think, make a very strong argument that fighting was appropriate because we've tried everything else and here's the list of grievances that we can put, again, in a logical argument to justify the action they ended up taking.

[51:52] Yeah, I appreciate that. That's a very insightful comment because, as he just said, it wasn't as though the revolution was some kind of a knee-jerk reaction, but this went on over a period of years and they were negotiating, negotiating, negotiating, sending ambassadors back and forth to England, trying to get things resolved, trying to get England to lessen her demands and lighten the load or lighten the taxes a little bit and the more they squirmed and complained and protested to the crown, the tighter the screws got.

[52:25] And finally, it just came to the place of where they snapped and said, that's it. We've tried everything and we're not going to be subject to this any longer. I'm so glad they did.

[52:36] Anything else before we close? Anyone? Okay. I think we as Christians should be much in prayer all the time to be strong enough to stand for what is right.

[52:54] I'm not sure that that was easy for people like Daniel and those fellows. Thank you, Gene. Thank you.

[53:05] You're absolutely right. First, in order to stand, first of all, you've got to have the conviction. You've got to have the conviction.

[53:16] You've got to know why you're standing. and you've got to be convinced that it's worth standing for. It's worth paying a price. And the only way that you can have that conviction and have the gumption to stand is to be adequately informed.

[53:36] And that's why I do my dead level best to just keep bringing material before you that you need to read and update yourself on and be aware of because you can't count on the media to give you all that you need to know.

[53:51] Sometimes it comes across with a lot of bias and a lot of slants. Well, thank you for your kind attention. If you'll stand, please, we'll be dismissed. Father, we are so grateful for this incredible nation that we have, that has birthed us, and yet we see aspects of cherished values slowly eroding right before our very eyes.

[54:23] We don't want to be reactionary, but we do want to be responsible. And we believe that under you we have an obligation, first of all to you and to this great nation, and to the people who live herein who may not even be aware of what is happening or of the threat that it poses and what the end result could be if these cherished freedoms that we so often take for granted are placed upon the scrap heap and replaced with political correctness and modernity and sophistication of man and all the rest.

[55:06] We want to be responsible, and we want that backbone the apostles had and demonstrated where they knew what they knew, and they would not be dissuaded, and they would not be silenced.

[55:22] God, give us that kind of courage. We desperately need it in our day, and we look to you for it in Christ's name. Amen. Amen. Amen.