The Rick & Bubba Bible Study - LIVE - April 14, 2021

one hello and welcome to the wednesday bible study thank you for taking time to join us today as we continue uh our ongoing study uh based on the book by j.i packer knowing god and today we will actually be in session 17. uh i'm rick burgess if you're new to this uh a co-host of the rick and bubba show which explains if you're watching on youtube why you find me inside the wrecking ball studio also director of the man church.com themanchurch.com is a hub where you can go to get everything that you would need to put together a discipleship strategy for the men of your church or community we're providing something for men's ministry that has been sorely lacking and that's resources designed by men for men uh including uh you know 40 day devotionals and resources we do have some third-party uh books that we also recommend from other men the steve farrar and tony evans and lance ingram and uh and there's there's other authors that are there as well uh but but we have our own curriculum our own resources that we put together the 40-week curriculum that came out last year is called the pursuit designed uh to to take you on a pursuit of christ-centered masculinity it's a 40-week curriculum we have around 157 158 churches that are doing that we have a handful of churches that when it came out last march that we're still able to work through the year even in the pandemic mainly using a zoom and some other technology to get that done and and some of those have started into our second 40-week curriculum which is called real men based on eight men of the bible five weeks on each and it is not available uh for uh public consumption yet but i should have a pretty good update on that for you coming up lord willing on next week's bible study but be just go to themanchurch.com and you can find that information also let you know some things that we'll be doing uh one of the churches that's starting the second phase uh the second year of our discipleship strategy is a church in opa-locka alabama first baptist church they're in the second curriculum and i have the honor of speaking there for their second year of man churches i'll be with charles billingsley who is a fantastic singer and hymn writer and and his entire band will be there that'll be april the 22nd you're welcome to come if you would like if you can be in that area it is a ticketed event and you can get those tickets by going to burgessministries.com and just click on the upcoming events then we get into our men's discipleship strategy we'll implement that with our first man church at rainbow presbyterian church that's in gadsden alabama that's coming up on april the 25th that'll be their first man church and they'll be starting the curriculum on the 30th of april we'll be at chittooga high school there in the gymnasium we'll be there with forged men's ministry uh that'll be a forged men's event they're in somerville georgia if you'd like to join us for that we'll have all of our resources there i have the honor of speaking there and then coming up on may the 2nd another man church now this this church has already started in cochlea georgia rich wingo one of our speakers spoke at their first man church uh they're now rolling through about halfway through the curriculum i'll be there for their second man church and you're welcome to that uh that is a free uh just just it's free and also the somerville georgia one is free but you do need to check out how to let them know that you're coming again that's may 2nd and there's other things coming up but don't forget to get your group together for the gridiron men's conference that's a uh friday night and half a day saturday event father's day weekend uh coming up in huntsville alabama their second year to host that i'm looking forward to being there with hershel walker will be there ike reichard will be there gary chapman will be speaking charles billingsley we'll be providing the praise and worship again and you can find that information also at burgessministries.com under upcoming events there's a lot more going on you can find it all there and if you're also looking for just some man church services i mean meaning i may not be speaking at it but some guys on our team might be speaking you can find all those man church dates and that's all those are at themanchurch.com so let's open in a word of prayer let's jump right in to session 17 and talk about knowing more not just about god but actually knowing god lord jesus will you please see us through this today holy spirit will you refine us convict us and help us uh to be affirmed even when we we hear something today from your holy word uh that uh that confirms us and affirms us uh lord i pray that you will continue to speak through me uh through all my imperfections to make sure that we hear your word perfectly and then apply it to our lives today in your holy name we pray amen so if you remember and i remember this when oprah winfrey began to talk about the one and only living god and she said this quite boldly and god's showing his mercy he's allowed her to continue to do what she does uh and giving her every opportunity to repent uh of her making the statement that she was kind of going to go her own way and kind of seek the god that she preferred i guess this is a god that she has created through all of her philosophical uh mystic mentors and all the things that she's continued to do on her show but she said the reason why she rejected the holy god of the bible and i'm holding up god's holy word for those of you that are not watching on youtube she rejected what god said about himself on the very characteristic that we will talk about today she says i don't want to believe in or serve a god that is jealous uh she said i i find that to be petty i find that to be like a temper tantrum why would god be jealous now uh the problem that oprah has and this is the problem that i had when i was um not uh not educated on the word of god and i i knew a little bit about god but i really didn't know god and and see where oprah made her mistake is she has no idea what god is talking about she is seeing this word jealous through our lens through human beings not through the lens of the bible she didn't take time to figure out the kind of jealousy that the bible talks about but let's let's be clear our god that we serve is called a jealous god uh and and and the scriptures are very clear about that now we when we hear that there's sometimes there's a little push back it can sound defensive uh but again we're looking through it from our lens so first of all we have to go back to the other things we know about god that he's perfect so if he's perfect then this cannot be some attribute that he's assigned to himself that is sinful in any way or it's out of line so so what type of jealousy is the word of god speaking about and that's going to be our focus today that we make sure we get this right we must not see it from our point of view we must look at this attribute of god being jealous through the holy scripture uh in scripture we see god repeatedly speaking of his jealousy repeatedly so so let's take some time to to unpack that uh a little bit today uh so if if you don't get very far in god talking to moses when when he's putting together the ten commandments uh we only get two commandments in before we hear god telling us what he's a jealous god that's the second commandment that was spoken audibly to moses and inscribed by the finger of god on the tablets of stone if you've never read this part of the bible you can find it just go to the book of exodus and you'll see it there in chapter 31 and this is what god says about himself in exodus 31 and verse 18. this is what he spoke and then wrote with his finger on on these tablets of stone with moses he said i the lord your god am a jealous god so you'll find that um in chapter 20 of exodus uh in verse 5. so we see god saying in the second commandment i the lord your god am a jealous god and a little later god told moses even more strikingly and this is the one that i took away i don't i don't know why i miss this in scripture the many times i've studied uh in exodus 31 and then for exodus 20 that i'm talking about now uh when when reading about the ten commandments and this the way it was done i i missed in exodus 34 14 until i was doing this bible study see when i'm teaching this bible study i'm learning with you we're doing we're doing this together there's some things i might have been aware of and i'm i'm learning more about them and then there's things that even going through scripture we miss you know the word of god it never stops teaching i don't care how long you've been learned in it and this is it this is even a little more striking than the second commandment uh he says to moses the lord referring to himself whose name is jealous is a jealous god so god assigns that as one of his names uh you know we've heard him in in chapter three uh in exodus refer to himself as what i am who i am or i am simply in chapter six he says one of my names is what the lord jehovah i am the lord uh these names spoke of him uh as as self-existing and self-determining and of course sovereign we can't miss that but then in chapter 34 when he when he refers to jealous as his name he's proclaiming his his name to moses by telling him that jehovah the lord uh is is the compassionate and gracious god he says i'm slow to anger i'm abounding in love and we've covered this in in other other chapters of this study and faithfulness forgiving wickedness yet he does not leave the guilty unpunished remember we just talked about that uh this is in 34 verses 6 and 7. here was a name that set forth god's moral glory finally seven verses further on as part of this same conversation that we're all pretty familiar with with moses god summed up and rounded off the revelation of his name by declaring it to be jealous so so all these things equal you being a jealous god according to scripture and according to god himself which which we all need if you want to know the most about god you need to find out what he said about himself uh and and he is saying this equals me being a jealous god so this is unexpected that th this word stood for equality in god which far from being inconsistent with with the uh exposition of his name that had gone before was was in some sense and this is the part i had to figure out the epitome of it are you tracking with me stay with me now i know and since this quality was in a true sense his name it was clearly important that we should understand it it's almost like god says let me summarize all this i'm jealous i'm a jealous god but remember it it's not through our lens now the bible says so much about god's jealousy i honestly don't know that i can give you i mean we would be here all day if i read every single one of the verses now i'm going to tell you we're going we are going to go to numbers 25 and see this clearly in a very harsh way and we'll get to that but you can also find it in deuteronomy 4 24 deuteronomy 6 15 deuteronomy 29 20 deuteronomy 34 16 also you see in uh 32 16. i'm sorry and also in chapter 32 of deuteronomy you'll find it in in 21 now these are history books uh but we also find it uh in joshua 24 19 first kings 14 22. the prophets talk about this ezekiel talks about it in chapter eight uh in chapter 16 uh and in chapter 42 and chapter uh i'm sorry 16 verses 38 and 42 chapter 23 of ezekiel chapter 36 of ezekiel verses 5 through 7 chapter 38 in ezekiel uh verse 19. uh chapter 39 of ezekiel in verse 25 joel talks about it nahum talks about it zephaniah talks about it zechariah talks about it the psalmists talk about it i mean it goes on and on and on so this is not something that god has been solid on it but undoubtedly oprah didn't like it which which tells me that the world didn't like it either there's a lot of people in the world they were honest i don't like this aspect of god i don't and but but if you don't like it it's because you don't understand it and i say that about myself too that's not just me you know uh looking down my nose in a self-righteous attitude i didn't fully understand this either because why when i hear the word jealous i think of the way we see jealousy now i will tell you today that you got to understand something even human beings can be jealous in a righteous way now now a lot of times when we're jealous it's in a sinful way and i'll tell you the difference but this same zeal which is what this is about this same zeal for god's standard uh can even be found in in the behavior of human beings and it not be sinful meaning we have zeal for god's standard and we we we have a jealousy about it that we let nothing come against it and that's not sin that goes kind of back to what we talked about about god's wrath and about god's anger about you know we we think of ourselves being angry and we usually do it sinfully but you can even as a human being under the authority of christ be indignant about something and have a righteous anger and now god's anger is always righteous so this is the same way about his jealousy his jealousy is also always righteous so when we see jealousy being attributed to god in scripture it is constantly presented as a motive to an action this is what motivates god to to do what he does his jealousy uh whether in wrath or mercy you say what are you talking about the wrath you can kind of understand can't you see that that's it's the mercy that's to me confusing i don't know why the world flips that around and thinks god's wrath is confusing but they totally understand his mercy i don't know how you come to that conclusion i think it's just the opposite but anyway god is moved to wrath because he is a jealous god but he's also moved to mercy because he is a jealous god uh matter of fact listen to what he says this is in ezekiel one of the one of the chapters and verses i told you ezekiel 39 20 25 in the king james version says this i will be jealous for my holy name meaning i'm jealous for my holiness i will not i will not allow anything come against my holy name and then he says talking about his mercy again i am jealous for jerusalem and for zion with a great jealousy that that's found in zechariah uh chapter 1 verse 14. so he says i'm jealous for my holy name there's a jealousy that i have about my name i don't let anything come against me it's protected it's sacred and i am jealous and will let nothing happen to that kind of like you see and then he looks at it he looks at jerusalem he looks at zion and he says and i'm jealous for them meaning they're mine they're my chosen people and i will deal with them harshly but you won't you ever had that happen before you think well you have had that in the family we may fight amongst each other but don't come against one of our family members suddenly we'll be protecting them you know you don't we'll all turn on you uh you know or as my wife has a a funny uh t-shirt that she wears mess with me mess with the whole trailer part so so uh so so it's it's it's god saying that he is jealous for his purity and nothing comes against it but he's also jealous for those that belong to him and that's where that mercy comes in so the lord and this is what nahum says and we talked about this name says this in in chapter one when we were studying his some of his scriptures the other day the prophet he says in chapter one verse two the lord is a jealous god and a vengeance so so he avenges because he is a jealous god the new testament listen what paul says uh paul um asked the corinthians uh and and you know you know when paul's writing these letters to corinth he he's he's really got a problem especially in first corinthians but even in second as well but in first corinthians paul is trying to figure out how these corinthians can claim to be the church under the authority of god to the church that jesus christ you know started when he went to the cross and when he walked out of the tomb and now the grace age the church age began he's saying to the corinthians and he's asking this question when he sees the open sin that is taking place in in the church of god and in the church of jesus christ and he says this shall we provoke the lord to jealousy i mean he's bringing that up hey guys you think god's just going to sit there and let this go or are you going to provoke his jealousy and the protection of the purity of his church hey he's jealous about this church he's not going to let somebody sit here and blaspheme this church are you going to provoke the lord to jealousy and this is in first corinthians chapter 10 verse 22 if you want to write that down so if you look at james chapter 4 uh verse 5 look at james chapter 4 verse 5 he yearns jealousy unto jealousy is the literal word here unto jealousy he yearns unto jealousy over the spirit which he has made to dwell in us he like meaning he's telling this is james again talking to his church you know you this is james the first pastor of a bunch of christians in jerusalem and he says hey guys you know if you walk through the book of james he's talking to people that are in the church we shouldn't be doing this we shouldn't be doing that why is this going on why are you treating your employees this way whatever and then he comes back and he says in in chapter 4 this is right before he tells them to submit themselves then to god to resist the devil and he'll flee from them to come near to god and he'll come near to you he's calling for correction in the church and here's what he says in chapter four he says god yearns unto jealousy over the spirit which he has made to dwell in us you can't treat the holy spirit this way go go to acts chapter five with ananias and sapphira what what does peter say to ananias when he tries this scheme acting like he's a a member of the church along with his wife you know what he says how if you allow satan to convince you to to lie to the holy spirit you haven't you haven't lied to us you've lied to god and what happens we know that god killed them why because he's jealous about the spirit that he gave over the church he's jealous of the holy spirit he's not going to let somebody sit here and blaspheme the holy spirit without that raising his jealousy but it's a righteous jealousy because it's protecting the perfect standard it's protecting holiness it is responding to those that come against his people or his church whether within it on the outside of it everybody tracking so what's the nature of god's jealousy what's the nature so remember this you know the bible talks a lot of times because yes we're created in god's image but we are not literally you know tiny little gods and so there's descriptions of god in in language in the bible that that are drawn from from our life as humans you hear you hear the bible talking about god's arm god's hand i just mentioned god's finger uh his hearing seeing smelling his tenderness his anger uh repentance laughter joy so on the reason why god uses these terms and he does use them to speak to us about himself is that this is language drawn from our own personal life and it's the most accurate medium that we have for communicating thoughts about him he understands this he creates us so he'll speak to us in in terms that we can understand even though he's not human we can understand what he's talking about when he talks to us about things that that our human experience this is because he's a personal god he he's personal and so are we in a way nothing else in the physical creation is only man uh of all the physical creatures was made in god's image i know some of y'all think animals were but they weren't uh only human beings were made in god's image so where you have to be careful just because god talks in this way be sure as j.i packer says don't get the wrong end of the stick though thinking that when now he brings up jealousy he must be talking about the way we're jealous no just because he speaks to us in ways we can understand don't take that and assign it to everything we have to remember that man is not the measure of of our maker he's the measure of us but we are not the measure of him he's trying to talk to us in a way that we can comprehend but we never take our attributes in the way we see things and then push it on him a lot like what i learned from a lot of folks who have taught me and mentored me and and have have grown me spiritually one of the things i learned from them number one is you can speculate about the bible but be sure you always acknowledge that you're speculating also let your theology rise up out of scripture don't take a predisposed theology and force it down on scripture which i see that a lot and i used to do that a lot and sometimes i make the mistake of doing it now but but i i i get convicted and corrected so we are not the measure of him he is the measure of us so when the language of human personal life is used of god none of the limitations of human beings go with that god may talk about his hand and his finger and his tenderness but we don't take the limitations of all that in us and say well he must be limited to when he does all that no same thing with jealousy he actually has jealousy under control in the proper righteous way we may not so so make sure that we don't limit god with our creaturehood uh and and limit our limit of knowledge our limit of power or foresight or our limit of strength or uh or apparently and i look we all got this as long as we got we got this flesh still on us our level of consistency which sometimes we can be embarrassingly inconsistent god is not so anything of that we must throw away okay so his wrath and we talked about this in great length i'm not going to spend a lot of time here because we've already talked about it but but an example is what we talked about when we did the attribute of god's wrath his wrath is not outrageous out of control outbursts like we are human anger also is is usually a sign in most cases when we're angry and it would apply to jealousy when we're angry when we're jealous when we're wrathful it usually in human beings it rises up out of the the original sin pride really when i get angry most of the time i'm thinking how dare you treat me that way as if i'm not worthy of that uh it i i must defend myself i must correct myself uh i i don't and then if you get into jealousy i don't like that you have something i don't have i deserve what you have i'm jealous of that i'm jealous that your kid is better at sports than mine when maybe you worked harder with your kid than i did with mine but i just don't like that see that's sinful jealousy our anger many times is sinful anger our our our desire to to punish somebody usually comes from pride god doesn't have that problem uh he didn't have our weaknesses uh he is holiness and this is this is big when his wrath is handed out when his anger is handed out if his jealousy is handed out guess where it comes from holiness it's holiness reacting to evil in a way that is always morally right and glorious the wrath that comes from god against all that come against holiness is correct the anger that comes from god that is that is his holiness against everything that is unholy is correct his jealousy of his holiness mean meaning i will let no one compromise me i'll let no one come against me that jealousy is also righteous his jealousy is not a compound of frustration envy in spite as human jealousy so often is but but it actually appears as a literal i mean literally praise worthy zeal to preserve something supremely precious you got to get that god's jealousy does not come from envy it does not come from weakness it does not come from pettiness it does not come from pride it's zeal and i want you to get this word zeal he is zealous he has zeal because what he is doing is he is preserving his perfectness his holiness that is supremely precious and and that's where this comes from i don't let anything be compromised about me i have zeal and i am jealous against anything that comes against it i'm jealous of the perfection and i will not let it be compromised so this kind of goes to our next point and we touched on it but let's let's dig in a little deeper so i think you can understand it because i know i did there's two sorts of jealousy among humans and and only one of them is a vice if i got your attention let's walk through this i know what we think we we we've taken jealousy and we've said any kind of jealousy is wrong shouldn't be jealous that's not correct that's incorrect there is a righteous jealousy even within human beings and i'll give you some examples vicious jealousy is an expression of the attitude of i want what you've got and that's sinful i hate you because i haven't got what you have i'm jealous of your house i'm jealous of your money i'm jealous of your children i'm jealous of your car i'm jealous of your whatever i'm jealous of your talents uh and i just don't like it and i don't lie and how about this the worst kind of jealousy is i'm jealous about it i'm not sure i even want it i just don't want you to have it and and and that that's the that's the sinful jealousy it's infantile it's a resentment springing from unmortified coveted us i mean we are coveting what the other people have and we're jealous that they have it and we don't that expresses itself in things like envy malice uh or just good old meanness you know sometimes people just mean i i'm just mean because i don't like that this person has something that i don't have or they have something i just don't want them to have so it is terribly potent for it feeds and is fed by what we said it pride and underline this i want you to write this down pride is the taproot of our fallen nature where did it all begin lucifer was jealous of his position versus gods he tries to overthrow god god throws him down on the earth where he then he's kicked out of heaven with a third of the angels he then goes to the human beings and convinces them to sin against god by saying what he doesn't want you to know what he knows he he's got something in this tree that he don't want you to have you know what you deserve to have it just like he does pride we want to decide what is right and wrong we don't we don't want to let it stay under god's authority and let him decide what's right and wrong when you look at that tree of of of good and evil the tree of knowledge whatever it's been called human beings convinced by the original rebel and the original original uh prideful jealous creature lucifer now the devil and and then satan he now convinces them that the reason why god doesn't want you to go to this tree is he wants you to live in this paradise where he decides what's right and wrong and that ought to be your decision and hey baby we've been doing that ever since we'll decide what's right and wrong not you we'll decide so again the taproot of all of our fallen nature is pride and that's where sinful jealousy comes from and that certainly isn't the kind of jealousy that god has in his nature anger is a cruel and fury overwhelming but who can stand before jealousy that is uh one of the wise men who wrote proverbs 27 verse 4. anger is cruel and fury overwhelming but listen to this but who can stand before jealousy no one when it's the sinful kind of jealousy but now let's talk about even as human beings we can have the correct jealousy uh because remember this is also an attribute of god that he can that he can produce in us if we are redeemed there's another kind of jealousy and it's called it's back to being zealous or having zeal what listen zeal to protect a love relationship or to avenge it when it's broken this jealousy also operates in the sphere of sexual intimacy inside a marriage uh and and now it does not appear as a blind reaction of wounded pride but as the fruit of marital affection remember what the writer of hebrews said inspired by the holy spirit may marriage be held in a place of honor by all by everyone and may the marriage bed never be defiled so if i in my marriage i am i have zeal for god's standard and you try to come into my marriage or if you're or as my wife ascend up try to come in between our marriage either one of us and whoever tried to come against our marriage and god's standard we would be jealous in a righteous way that we do not allow anyone to to to have an inappropriate relationship with our spouse and we stand in a righteous jealousy protecting our marriage that's righteous because that is god's standard that is the kind of jealousy he has about his holiness that's the kind of jealousy he has about his church that's kind of jealousy and you're going to see this you do realize the lord god almighty uses this analogy about those of us who are unfaithful to him and he gets ugly of what he refers to those that are not faithful to the relationship of the church the bride and the bridegroom jesus christ he refers to us when we wonder as an unfaithful bride so even in the earthly marriage of man and woman and if you don't see that going on right now in our in our society do you think it's just a happenstance that the adversary and the wickedness of this world is trying its best to destroy god's standard of marriage you just think that's just kind of a i guess that's just a random thought by evil no it's going after something that god has deemed holy and something that he has zeal for because it's the same analogy used for our lord and savior the bridegroom and the church his bride and it has always been the standard that god looks through his people and him it's a marriage relationship and he loves marriage and anybody who comes against it ought to are to be art art to run into a righteous jealousy from us and god and as a matter of fact uh professor tasker has written married persons who felt no jealousy at the intrusion of a lover or an adulterer into their home would surely be lacking in moral perception for the exclusi the exclusiveness of marriage is the essence of marriage that's what makes marriage marriage it's exclusiveness jesus himself jesus himself on the sermon on the mount and then again in the in in later in i think chapter 19 of matthew he even says i i do not allow divorce and divorce is a sin and then jesus says unless jesus unless someone has violated violated the exclusion of exclusiveness of it now i know many marriages this has happened and forgiveness was found and the marriages are doing great that doesn't mean it's a get out of marriage free card but jesus christ acknowledges that the the attack of the intimacy of a man and a woman is so severe they may not be able to survive it and if they can't and they can't get past it i understand because it it's it causes so much damage so here is professor tasker in in his book the epistle of james and he says if you're really married under the authority of christ and you're married and you have joined together in holy matrimony and you don't have jealousy of an intrusion into the sexual intimacy and purity of that marriage you probably lack in moral perception and you don't understand god's design for marriage you ought to have jealousy against anybody coming against your marriage and it's a righteous jealousy and if you don't have it you don't really understand the holiness of marriage so see when a husband is jealous about anybody coming after his wife our wife is jealous about anybody who comes after her husband those people have a righteous jealousy because they're protecting the sanctity of what god calls holy now they're not overreacting they're not being petty they're protecting and they have zeal for what god has deemed holy and what god said nobody should come against and for a marriage bed that god said better not be defiled and anybody who defiles it will have to answer to him so there's two kinds of jealousy even in the human experience so scripture consistently views god's jealousy as being of the latter kind not the first kind obviously and that is in an aspect of his covenant love for his own people the old testament regards god's covenant as his marriage with israel and we have the same type covenant with his marriage to the church carrying with it a demand for unqualified love and loyalty the worship of idols was always an issue in the old testament and god always saw it as his people compromising with with the non-israelite uh idolaters and this constituted in god's eyes disobedience remember i said a minute ago unfaithfulness which god saw as spiritual adultery provoking him to jealousy and vengeance he always sees either his people in the old covenant that was that was the chosen people of israel when they went after other gods and they went out went with other people who blasphemed him he said that's spiritual adultery unfaithfulness and now in the church age all of us who claim to be redeemed but through his grace by his grace through our faith in him if we claim that we have faith in him and him alone if we believe in our heart we confess with our mouth that he is lord and we exclusively want to be redeemed and then thus being made perfect in his image fully righteous now we belong to him the bride the church and he is the bridegroom when we betray that relationship we bring god's jealousy and vengeance because we have been an unfaithful bride all the mosaic references to god's jealousy have to do with idol worship in one form or another and they all hark back to the sanction of that second commandment commandment i am a jealous god i don't share my people with other gods i don't share my glory with other gods i don't share my holiness with other gods i am a jealous god and i'm exclusive in my relationship to my people and um that's something important to note now you say well i don't worship any uh other gods well you may not have a god that you made out of wood that you go and bow down to at your house or some asher pole out in your backyard but anything anything that we love more that we fear more that we serve more that we value more than god is an idol and it leads to us being unfaithful bride and he sees it as spiritual adultery and unfaithfulness and he's a jealous god the same is true you see in joshua 24 19 first kings 14 22 psalm 78 58 and of course in the new testament i just told you about the church at corinth uh in first corinthians 10 22 back to the old testament ezekiel talks about this in chapter 8 verse 3 an idol worshiped in jerusalem is called the image of jealousy which provokes jealousy when we're worshiping something other than god we are worshiping an image of jealousy and it provokes god's righteous jealousy and you've seen this in ezekiel 16 i mean i know some of you may have this on your house so i have to be careful even some of the things that god says about this not because he doesn't have the right to say it it just may may not lead to a conversation you want to have with your children or something in the home but god depicts israel as his adulterous wife embroiled in unholy liaisons with idols and idolaters the idolaters of canaan egypt and assyria and pronounces the sentence as follows listen to this here's what he says when they chased after the gods of canaan egypt and assyria i will judge you as women who break wedlock and shed blood are judged and i will bring upon you the blood of wrath and jealousy i see you as an adulterous wife and i'll bring and i will bring on my that will bring me me to wrath and it will bring my jealousy from these passages we plainly uh see what god meant by telling moses that his name was jealous he meant that he demands from those whom he has loved and redeemed utter and absolute loyalty and he will vindicate his claim by stern action against them if they betray his love and continue in unfaithfulness wow look at this if you have your bible or something with your bible on it look what happens in in numbers chapter 25 the book of numbers chapter 25 we have god's people uh and and i won't use the word that's used here if you have children in the room but it's um it's a word that is known uh for a woman who is loose and it says that his people begin to commit this unfaithfulness with the daughters of moab the men there began to sleep with women who who were evil and idol worshipers and they invited them to to the men went with them to the sacrifices to their gods and the people ate and bowed down to their gods and god says in verse 3 so israel yoked himself to baal uh and and the anger of the lord was kindled against israel and the lord said to moses take all the chiefs of the people and hang them in the sun before the lord that the fierce anger of the lord may turn away from israel he's cursing israel he said if you don't do something with these men that are committing adultery with these moab women the moabites then then i'm going to put a curse on you until you deal with them my jealousy and my anger burns against you and moses said to the judges of israel each of you killed those of his men who have yoked themselves to baal and behold one of the people of israel came and brought a a media a a midianite woman to his family so moses is coming out and god's really mad at all this and and and god says i want you to kill these men and hang them out here in the sun and then i'll lift the curse while all this is going on and moses is telling uh that he's telling the judges to start doing this one guy just walks up with this with this woman and takes her into his tent uh right there in front of what's going on with these judges and with moses and listen at 6. so moses saw this and in the sight of the whole congregation of the people of israel while they were weeping in the entrance of the tent of meeting when this is the this is one of the uh the priests when phineas the son of elizar and son of aaron the priest saw it he rose he left the congregation now he's going over to the guy's tent you see him going over there this guy just walks in with another one of these loose women that he's gonna go sleep with in his tent while all this is going on exactly what god said not to do and it in here and so phineas gets up he rose left the congregation he took a spear in his hand listen to this and he went after the man of israel into the chamber and this visual i'll show you what was going on in there he walks into this man's chamber and he pierces both of them the man of israel and the woman through her belly he killed him in the act and i want you to listen what god's response to that was thus the plague on the people of israel was stopped nevertheless those who died by the plague were twenty four thousand and listen to what what uh what god said about phineas and the lord said to moses phineas the son of elizar son of aaron the priest has turned back my wrath from the people of israel are you ready everybody still with me in that he was jealous with my jealousy among them so that i did not consume the people of israel in my jealousy you know what he said that's what i needed done that's somebody who was finally understanding how serious this was to blaspheme me like this i'm a jealous god and phineas was jealous on my behalf and he carried out my jealousy into the people he did what i asked you to do and now my wrath will be lifted it sounds like all this is an extremely big deal for god's ultimate objective as the bible declares is threefold to vindicate his rule and righteousness by showing his sovereignty and judgment upon sin to ransom and redeem his chosen people and to be loved and praised by them for his glorious acts of love and self vindication that's it in a nutshell god's objective as the bible declares is is basically threefold he's going to vindicate his rule and righteousness by showing that he is sovereign in his judgment upon sin but then listen to this so we got to get that part to understand the next part then to ransom praise his holy name and redeem his chosen people and then to be loved and praised by them for his glorious acts of love and self-vindication i'm righteous in my judgment on sin i offer you redeem redemption from that judgment and then when i redeem you from that judgment i expect you to praise me and be thankful for it is that how you live your life is that how i live my life his jealousy and all of its manifestations is precisely what the zeal of the lord almighty for fulfilling his own purpose of justice and mercy god's jealousy leads him on on the one hand to judge and destroy the faithless among his people who fall into idolatry and sin we find this in deuteronomy 6 14-15 joshua talks about it in chapter 24 verse 19 and 20. talks about this in chapter 1 verse 18 and indeed to judge the enemies of righteousness and mercy everywhere we see this throughout scripture it also leads him on the other hand to restore his people after national judgment has chastened and humbled them chastened i'm sorry and humbled them meaning if you see this in the old testament it happens all the time he he gives out his love to his chosen people they go after other gods he then punishes them he chastens them for doing it he humbles them they come back to him he's willing to forgive and and then and then he sets them right where they should be and then finally we know that the time of this kind of of of grace in the new testament will also end his name in is his nature in the character of jehovah the lord rule of history guardian of righteousness and savior of sinners and and and god means his name to be known and honored and praised and he's jealous uh with with with the honor and the praise that only he deserves i am the lord he says this is my name i will not give my glory to another or my praise to idols for my own sake for my own sake i do this how can i let myself be defamed i will not yield my glory to another is the nutshell of his jealousy i i will not do it isaiah 42 verse 8 read it isaiah 48 verse 11. so what's our response to this as we get ready to close this week well you heard you heard what he just said i'll tell you what one of it is the jealousy of god requires us to be zealous for god are you do you just let people blaspheme god do you let people just take his name and blaspheme it in your presence do you just allow this kind of behavior to go on and you just keep on hanging around people that continue to blaspheme god without ever defending god will you defend god in the public arena we're called to do so i love bishop j.c raw if you ever read any of his books it's a deep dive listen what he said about us being zealous for our jealous god zeal in religion is a burning desire to please god to do his will and to advance his glory in the world in every way possible it is a desire which no man feels by nature i love this if you're not redeemed if you've never been changed by god you don't have this desire you don't have this zeal to defend him it doesn't happen to us by nature not by our sin nature so the spirit j.c ross says puts this in the heart of every believer when he is or she is converted but which some believers feel so much more strongly than others and that they alone deserve to be called zealous men meaning be careful that you don't think that you are the the one who's zealous and no one else is but the bigger point that ryle is making is this does not happen to us naturally the reason you don't have any zeal for god may be that you don't know him you might know about him but you just may not know him you may never really been redeemed by him do you have that that burning zeal in your spirit jeremiah 20 verse 9 there's a fire that shut up in my bones and even when i don't want to talk about you i still do why did jeremiah keep defending god when everybody blasphemed him even though they all hated jeremiah for doing it why didn't he just stop he even says in chapter 20 that he wants to stop i don't want to do this anymore because i don't like the reaction i get from the world but then what is he saying but i can't help it there is a zeal there is a passion that burns up in my bones so i have to talk about you i have to defend you i can't stop are you that way does it do you just does it just make you cringe to hear anybody being faithful and blaspheme the jealous god that you serve they should what's the next one the jealousy of god threatens churches which are not zealous for him take the book of revelation and go over to uh to chapter three and you probably know where i'm going the church at laodicea the church at laodicea which um which which represents um an issue that a lot of churches have and that is that you're delusional about who you really are and what we see here in verse 15 is that god says to the church at laodicea you're delusional you do not have zeal for me the way you are doing church i'm not even there it says i know your works you're neither cold nor hot would that you were either cold or hot but because you're a lukewarm and neither hot nor cold you're neither one i spit you out of my mouth you know what he's dealing with here in the church at laodicea can i tell you what he's dealing with right here self-sab satisfying apathy ever been in a church like that we are so full of ourselves we are satisfied with where we are we got our programs we got our the way we do things we wouldn't veer off a service if our life depended on it and we got money and we got blessings and we got all these beautiful people and god says but you have no seal for me you you don't defend me in the public arena you don't want to make trouble you're comfortable you're apathetic we are good and what really you're having here is you you're having no impact for the kingdom i wish you at least be hot i can do something with hot water i wish you at least be cold you those hot water and cold water serve purpose lukewarm water serves no purpose so i spit you out of my mouth you're delusional about where you are you may sound respectable but you're lukewarm there's nothing holy about you you don't have zeal for me you're not engaging the culture and defending me you're trying to lay low and not make trouble so you can go on and have your service again and you can do all the stuff you got on the calendar during that week all you really are is some spiritual social club you're not a church and i've heard it preached many times and there's certainly nothing wrong with this but it's not it's not biblically correct in verse 20 when you see jesus talking about the church at laodicea the church that lacks the zeal for god and he says behold i stand at the door and i knock i've heard people preach that as jesus knocking on your heart and that's fine i mean i'm not i'm it's not my place to say but that's not what jesus is talking about jesus is knocking on the door of his church he's knocking on the door of the church at laodicea he's knocking on the door of the church that has lost its zeal for god and you know why he's knocking on the door because he's not there who will get up and come let me in who will be who will have zeal for me who's ready to either be hot or cold and to get up out of the congregation and come to this door and let me back into the church you are having church but i'm no part of it it's not a redemption message it's a redemption message for the church but jesus is not standing and knocking at the door of your heart he's knocking at the door of his church and he's knocking at the door of the church that has lost its zeal for him let's close with this acts 20 24. let's go to the book of acts i love this verse as a matter of fact it was shown to me by one of my dearest friends as his favorite verse and i got to reading it and loving it just like he does and i'm thankful that he showed it to me and this is what this is paul's summing up his zeal for the gospel write this down acts 20 24 and this is what we'll close with this week but i do not account my life of any value nor is precious to myself if only i may finish my course in the ministry that i have received from the lord jesus to testify to the gospel of the grace of god now see that zeal if you don't consider your life to have any value unless you defend the gospel unless you go make disciples unless you say i have so much zeal for you i am so thankful for your redemption let me tell you something i will defend you against all who come against you i will advance your kingdom and i would rather be in good standing with you god than with good standing with the world i don't live my life to be sure i don't offend people i live my life to be sure i don't offend you because you are a jealous god and may i never be found to be an unfaithful bride to you and paul says my life is of no value it is not precious to me if i don't finish the course in the ministry that i received from jesus to testify to the gospel of the grace of god that's all that gives my life value is that how you feel is is is this something your relationship with god something that you get to when everything else you really care about is tended to or is this at the center of your life and the only thing that makes your life worth any value you serve a jealous god and he expects us to know that characteristic of his jealousy and in us it creates a zealous attitude concerning him let's pray lord thank you for today we stand um corrected by you when we read your word how silly i feel right now to think that this these things these characteristics and these attributes of yours are are mentioned here or there throughout scripture the more you force me to study the more i realize that you really know how to drive a point home and if i haven't gotten it's not because you haven't told me about it it's called it's because i haven't taken the time to learn it and to listen apply these things to us lord forgive us of our unfaithfulness forgive us for our adultery against you and mold us into a faithful bride and continue to refine us to be people that can be trusted to never turn against you to never try to overthrow you to never try to take the place that only belongs to you you are holy you are worthy of praise you are glorious we are not we lowly come before you we're wretched we're sinners we ask for forgiveness and teach us lord how we can glorify you you give us the power to do so we defend you against all who come against you in your holy name we pray amen thank you for taking time to be with us if i can help you in any way rick rickbubba.com talk to you next week

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Id: 1NnFObaYhxs

Length: 60min 37sec (3637 seconds)

Published: Wed Apr 14 2021