Revering the Word
Numbers 33 The choice: Worship the God of the Bible or your own opinion.
Good morning everyone. This morning we are in Numbers 33 and it is a review of the journey from Egypt to the Jordan and God asks Moses to list where they camped in their journey. There were 40 places in which they camped after they got out of Egypt and before they got into the Promised Land. So it's going to be a review of that and I think it there's historical significance to having this recorded so that you know it can always be remembered where they were and where they went and there are some places that are recorded in here that aren't recorded in other areas so there's where there is a history of where they've been. God seems to care about that that we have a record of that. What I want to do though is move forward in Numbers 33 to verse 50 and we'll take in the last verse 50 through 56 together. This is what it says. "Then the Lord after He gives the list of where they've been spoke to Moses in the plains of Moab by the Jordan opposite Jericho saying..." This is right on the edge of the Promised Land. "Speak to the sons of Israel and say to them, 'When you cross over the Jordan into the land of Canaan, then you shall drive out all the inhabitants of the land from before you and destroy all their figured stones and destroy all their molten images and demolish all their high places and you shall take possession of the land and live in it. For I have given the land to you to possess it." Remember this is the land that was promised to Abraham's family. We have Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Jacob's name got changed to Israel. That's the land that we're talking about here and they are to go and take possession of the land that God had promised them. "You shall inherit the land by lot according to your families. To the larger you shall give more inheritance because Moses is going to have to divide it up into the smaller you shall..." Well Joshua eventually. "And the smaller you shall give less inheritance, wherever the lot falls to anyone, that shall be his. You shall inherit according to the tribes of your fathers. But if you do not drive out the inhabitants of the land from before you, then it shall be come about that those whom you let remain of them will become as pricks in your eyes and as thorns in your sides and they will trouble you in the land in which you live and as I plan to do to them so I will do to you." So let's begin with God is trying to give them this land and he wants them to be the people of his image and likeness who are fruitful and multiply and to have a nation that would worship him and that would be free of pagan worship and worship of false gods. You might remember you know one there at the plains of Moab they had the whole issue of beginning to worship Baal of Pior and you know that created a lot of problems for Israel and they just can't seem to stop doing that. So when they're around the people of the nations around them and those nations have other gods they start mingling with their women and then they start mingling with their gods and they don't remain true to worshiping God alone but all these false gods. God's very serious about this. He does not want us to worship anything. The Lord your God is one, worship the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, mind and strength. We're supposed to worship him and worship him alone and that's why he's asking them to drive them out but to destroy all their figured stones that's false God worship, destroy all their molten images, false gods and all their high places, false places of worship. These are all supposed to be destroyed and the people are supposed to be driven out so that they can be in the land and worship him alone. So God's always been about that. Isn't it interesting you know we today you know I'm speaking this in America. In America it was founded based on a Christian ideology however because in England they were forced to worship the king's God or in the in the manner the king of the land wanted to worship and he banned their free worship of God. America was really founded based on the fact that they wanted to have freedom to worship God the way they wanted to worship God. It wasn't that they weren't Christian because they were but they didn't want to be forced by the government to worship in a way the government would prescribe. So America was founded based on a strong independence of government controlling worship so therefore when the Constitution was founded it gives a freedom of worship a freedom of religious expression and a freedom of speech as well. So we don't have clearly woven into our Constitution that you know we're going to worship Jesus or worship the Bible even though that was what the majority of the people did they didn't want to force that to happen. So we we don't root out other faiths we don't root out other gods or other high places or other molten images I mean now there's you know other churches there's other denominations there's other face there's other there's stores where you can go and buy you know molten images and fake high places and stuff like that. And we can't just you know it's not part of our Constitution it's not part of what Jesus asked us to do either is to root out people who are of other faith. However if we were to honor God and honor our Lord Jesus our nation and our our land would reflect the fact that we do worship Him and it's becoming increasingly unlike that. I mean the predominant theme is beginning to turn away from Christianity although that's still the most dominant religion. There is a strong emphasis of a liberality, a looseness, an unadherence to the Bible and basically man being the founder of what they believe. So instead of basing what someone believes on Christianity or the Bible man chooses and whatever man chooses is good and right post-modern what's good for you is good for you what's good for me is good for me and people worship what they believe even though it's not based on anything. I think about that I mean everyone can just decide it's as though everyone's opinion is equally valid that doesn't even make any sense if you think about it because people can just make up whatever they want and they can worship whatever they want that doesn't mean just because someone has something they want to worship it's equally valid it just it's just that's what we have in America today and sadly when you have false worship and false religiosity and you have the belief system in America this post-modern whatever I believe is good for me belief it's pervasive and it leads many people astray it would be like when Israel went into the promised land and if they didn't tear down the molten images in the high places they would there would be people amongst Israel that would end up just worshiping the gods of the land around them and that's the way it is today because it's it's like in this freedom that we have in America there's there's a whole manifold way of worshiping some kind of false god and because in a way it's told that we need to respect other people's opinion or what other people worship then not as much as said against it were in this case god saying you got to destroy it so therefore all the people in our land who are uneducated about Christianity in the Bible can easily be led astray because there's there's a plethora of options and and according to man they're all equally valid and uh so it's really it's really unfortunate i mean um you know i i love the fact and i think most of you would agree i i don't want to be told by government how to worship god i do want to be free to worship jesus and worship the bible so there's some really good aspects to the freedom that we have to worship jesus but you know we're supposed to influence this land be witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth and it's not good that in our freedom collectively in America and around the world there is such a influence of false pagan worship instead of worship of the one true god you know the bible teaches god is one god alone and and and he's been revealed now through jesus christ and that's the only true god everything else is just false that's that's the teaching of christianity everything else is a false god and there's only one true god and his name is jesus hallelujah and we should be promoting that and living that out and you know i guess god's not surprised right because when we take a look at you know eschatology the end times and what's going to happen in the future it's prophesied and predicted that there will be false worship and there'll be false worship of the antichrist and his false prophet and you know when jesus christ comes back the people who are still alive most of them are are going to have taken the mark of the beast and worshiped something other than jesus christ alone so god is is not surprised um but it's sad what's happening in america today um i think uh you know there's false beliefs that are being you know i was watching the the news the other day um it wasn't the news it was like a commercial and in america uh you know there's like a pride day it seems like there's a pride day every day but when i'm talking i'm talking about homosexual pride so it's pride month in june and there was a commercial on you know some of you might know i like golf well the golf channel is owned by nbc and you know nbc and its affiliates is a ton so they put on this logo um you know like on their tv about like america's pride or something like that and it had all the different emblems of like nbc and universal and there was like 15 different emblems media emblems all under the way that i would see it some kind of heading of mbc and it posted them all on the screen all the logos of all these um media corporations and it said something to the effect america is pride or we are pride and so think about that we have major corporations on our television sets promoting and celebrating to the world something that god says is an abomination and god says is sin now think about how that influences people because there are people that are totally uneducated on the bible and they're seeing major corporations and our tv's celebrate and promote as a holiday as a something we should celebrate something we should have parades about that is not of god that god clearly calls wrong and it's just a travesty because so many people who don't know the by they you know and maybe you're tempted to think this right now uh you could be persuade into thinking because predominant thought is going in this direction that somehow postmodern thought is right because people believe it that somehow because people believe well you know we should love everybody and everybody's created equal by god and now you start believing the lie that people are created that way and all of a sudden you're way down this path that's totally against the bible it's very sad to me um this particular issue um you know there are people that are growing up that are confused for whatever reason maybe they've been abused maybe they have felt like they haven't fit in maybe um maybe someone made fun of them or told them because they played with a doll or because they weren't good at sports or because they just didn't seem to get into dating relationships or whatever the case may be someone says oh well you know why it's because you're gay that's your solution that that's why you're you felt different in your life you're gay well it comes from a false set of beliefs it's not even true but yet because the world is promoting that it becomes a believable solution to people because so many in the world believe it and because it's being promoted on our television sets that it seems logical to people that that's the solution but if we were to go by the bible and we realized that god created them male and female and god calls uh homosexuality an abomination and a sin and if you believed wholeheartedly in the bible and you'd say well that can't be true because god says it's not true therefore it's not true therefore i'm not going to believe that that's a solution therefore what i need to do is figure out you know what i'm going through and why i'm struggling or why i didn't fit in this way and and realize that there's a another uh there's another way of thinking about it and maybe we need to get to the root of what caused you to think this and come to better terms with you know what not everyone's the same not everyone has to be a jock uh not you know there's maybe make go go to the abuse or or the hurt or the rejection that you faced and and and deal with it so that and learn from it so so that you don't just come to this um this false conclusion what what am i trying to say and why am i picking on this issue well this is a big issue of our day and for the large part most people have just given up on it and resigned themselves to this is some kind of new truth but what happens is the reason that's happened is because it's in our land and it's being promoted whereas what is israel asked to do here when you go into the land remove all these false gods and these false beliefs because if you don't they're going to become as a prick in your eyes and thorns in your sides and they will trouble you in the land in which you live and the god said as i plan to do to them so i will do to you and regardless of just homosexuality judgment's coming to this world you know jesus christ is going to come back ultimately as a judge and um you can't just have it your own way you can't just make up your own beliefs if you're not going to follow the bible you're following yourself and if you're following yourself instead of the bible that means you're not following god you're worshiping what you believe you're worshiping you if you don't follow the bible it means that you actually worship yourself because you think what you believe is better than what god said so therefore you're worshiping your own thoughts instead of god people don't always realize that but that's the truth and when god comes back to you know in a variety of ways whether it be at your death or whether it be at the rapture or whether it be at the return of jesus if you've made up your own religion you're not following the one true god jesus christ and the words that he left behind um and and you're going to face judgment so uh listen a post-modern belief that you can make up what you want to worship and what you want to believe it's a false god and it needs to be torn down in your life it needs to be destroyed in your life listen i'm not saying that um we go back to old testament times and start destroying you know uh you know we live in america for america there's freedom and people can choose but that doesn't mean it's right and if that doesn't mean it's right before god and that doesn't mean that there won't be judgment before god for just making up your own god and saying you believe what you want to believe that's a sure sign that you really haven't trusted in jesus or the word of god and um i'll tell you what the best life lived is on the word of god it's blessed me in every way to to to trust in jesus and to trust in his word i don't want to make up my own faith i don't why would i want to do that when god has left such good instruction for us so although we can't root out uh directly other people's false gods we can root out false worship in our own lives we can say no to anything that's not of god in our own lives we can tear it down and we should so that as best we can we lead ourselves and our families to worship the one true god and his son jesus christ and how he has revealed himself through his spirit and the word of god um indeed israel is going to struggle in the future and indeed they aren't going to root out everybody and you're going to hear this over and over as we go through the old testament they they did not end up rooting out the false gods or the people and they indeed ended up becoming snares and of ultimately god revealed himself in a new way through jesus christ and and now now we come to faith uh through him and may we use the freedom that we have in choice to choose jesus and to be saved from our sin and to be promised eternal life may we worship guy and him alone through his son jesus christ god bless you all