"They Found the Book (Streams of Light #1) - Pastor Doug Batchelor

[Music] who made the mountain who made the trees who made the river flow to the sea [Music] and the moon in the starry sky somebody bigger than you and i who made the flowers bloom in the spring who breathe the rivers flow to the sea and left the stars in the story sky somebody bigger than you and i he likes the way when the road is dark keeps you company with love to guide you he walks beside you just like he walks with me when i am weary filled with despair who gives me courage to go on from there and who gives me hope that will never die somebody bigger than you [Music] keeps you company with love to guide you he walks beside you just like he walks with me [Music] when i am weary filled with despair who gives me courage to go on from there and who gives me hope that will never die [Music] somebody bigger than you [Music] and [Music] amen thank you so much sister geraldine farmer brother phillip the piano appreciate that song very much oh hi england how are you doing you know i haven't been here for i was trying to figure it out i've been to england probably this is the third or fourth time but it's been 22 to 25 years my mother used to live here she was actually a film critic and used to write for punch magazine she lived in london and when i was a pagan teenager i'd come visit mom smoke and hang out in the pubs and then i came back with the heritage singers was the last time and i guess the church had a uh they call it the new gallery they did a concert there and i shared my testimony during that time and we went up to nottingham and i've been wanting to come back for years we've got so many friends here and you can almost understand me without a translator that's another benefit of coming to england and so it is good to be here again i want to welcome you here in birmingham i want to welcome our friends who are watching on 3abn lifestyle television and the internet sends special greeting to our friends in australia that almost speak english also i never had an x until i went there uh we just were there a month for about a month and had a wonderful experience you know there's a lot of history about revival in this country matter of fact a revival that started in england is uh one that spread to north america and i had a a wonderful experience yesterday as i arrived flew in yesterday brother adam ramden stopped in oxford we went to visit a church where a number of illustrious preachers had been where church where john wesley preached went to the square there where some martyrs had laid down their faith laid down their lives for their faith and for the word of god and it was inspiring and moving for me to to be in these places there's a rich history here but history often repeats itself even in places that have so much history regarding the word of god and so much experience it's possible to lose sight of the word of god and to forget what that heritage is you know there's a story in the bible that reminds us of that and i'd invite you to turn with me the message today if i were to give it a title would be they found the book and we're going to principally focus our attention on the importance of the word of god in our personal experience in salvation and in experiencing revival second chronicles the second book of chronicles chapter 34 nearly the end of the book one of the last kings of the southern kingdom of judah josiah eight years old when he came to the throne but evidently he had some spiritual guidance and good leadership that was helping uh guide him along the way and he consecrated himself to the lord you can read here in verse one josiah was eight years old when he became king and he reigned 31 years in jerusalem you had a few kings come to the throne pretty young in your country too and he did what was right in the sight of the lord and he walked in the ways of his father david he did not turn aside to the right hand or to the left for in the eighth year of his reign he's about 16 17. while he was still young he began to seek the god of his father david and in the 12th year of his reign he began to purge judah and jerusalem of the high places the wooden images the carved images the molded images quick translation he became convicted as he looked around he heard about the history of david and how god had worked marvelously in their nation he was getting mostly the oral tradition of what had happened and he knew idolatry was wrong from the ten commandments and everywhere he looked he saw idols he just hadn't done anything about it it took 12 years and he said this isn't right we've got to do something about this and so he was determined to get rid of the idols in the country that god might be seen that god might be worshipped and as he made this effort to do what he could do to draw close to the lord god then honored him and did something wonderful for the whole nation listen to how this unfolds and i hope you read the whole chapter by the way this is not only found here in second chronicles but if you look in second kings chapters 22 and 23 you find the story is sort of in stereo in the bible you've got little differences but it's basically the same account and you can read on here go to verse eight now in the eighteenth year of his reign when he had purged the land and the temple he sent chapin the son of a as elia mayasa the governor of the city and joao the son of jehoiah has the recorder to repair the house of his god why did the house of god need repair because it had been neglected everyone was busy worshiping idols by the way do you know that you are the house of god the house of god today is not a building as much as it is his people what don't you know that you are the temple of the holy spirit not only your body but god's people collectively jesus said destroy this temple made with hands in three days i'll make one without hands and he was speaking of his body the church is the body of christ the body was being neglected broken down paint was peeling wood was splintering there was graffiti on the walls of idolatry and you read about the cleansing it had just been neglected could that happen to us again so he makes this effort to renovate to to refurbish and to build up the house of the lord you could jump over here now to verse 14. look what happens it's almost inconceivable now when they brought out the money that was brought into the house of the lord the people gave towards this renovation of the temple when they brought up the money that was brought into the house of the lord hilkiah the priest found the book of the law of the lord given by moses now i want to pause here and just have you think about this they believe that this was not just a mimeographed copy of the law of moses but the original that moses wrote with his hand had been preserved all through the wandering in the wilderness it had been preserved through the time of the judges and through the time of samuel and through the time of saul and david and solomon all through the kings and as the different kings went uh strained from the lord with momentary revivals somehow it had got stuck in a corner somewhere where here you've got god's people who exist because of the word of god losing the book of god and as they're cleaning out the corners hilkiah the priest says oh here's a big scroll and it's carefully wrapped and i wonder what this is about he pulls out this ancient scroll probably the book of deuteronomy the last book that moses wrote before he died it's one sermon and as he's unscrolling it he's reading it he recognizes that this is very ancient and he gets to the end and it's signed by moses how could somebody lose the word of god in the house of god i mean what had they been doing for the last few hundred years they still had a temple they still had ritual they still had their traditions they still had their religious relationships but in the debris the trappings of all of their church activities somewhere along the way they'd lost the book could history repeat itself what do you think you folks say amen in england i was just checking i would have see i'm pretty subdued but i would have said it there even back in the states it can happen that even in the house of god we can lose the book of god i mean when you go to church if the minister reads like half a verse and then he pontificates by himself for 45 minutes you can lose the word of god in the house of god you know i really appreciate a message that is filled with scripture because that's where the power is one of my favorite preachers modern preachers is a retired black minister he's living in arizona right now my guess is that brother byron spears is watching right now on 3 abn and first time i heard him preach he's in his 70s pushing 80. they called him the walking bible i don't know if you've ever heard of elder spears he was an evangelist a pastor tremendous preacher and he had had polio when he was younger and and he would need two canes to stand on the platform while he preached and i don't know if that's the reason he couldn't hold the bible but somehow he had memorized every verse it seems like in the bible and he would preach an entire evangelistic series and that's when a series was a real series i'm talking months 30 meetings and every night he'd 50 60 scripture references from memory king james version he'd correct you if you misquoted a v or a vowel and you do it with a line like voice whole series i i would hear that and i go lord we must all have dane bramage or something if we can't remember scripture that is such a gift to be able to recall the word of god that way but the messages were filled with scripture i asked them one day i said do you have these recorded on cd he said no i said do you mind if we take some of your old cassette tapes because cassette tapes are going out you know and we found as many of elder spears sermons as we could find we put them all on cd because i thought he's like now he's 95 96 i remember when he was 92 we had him preach at our church had to carry him in a chair put him in a chair four deacons got around him lifted up the chair brought it up on the platform because at this point he goes around one of those little driving three-wheel machines and he then preached on the holy spirit i still remember what the subject was for probably 90 minutes 92 years old no bible in his hand 30 40 scriptures all from memory powerful voice by the way i've got a theory would you like to live a long time take care of your body but something else work for god the more you work for god the more excuse he's got to keep you around so he put all that on a cd series called the trumpet of the lord because i thought people are going to forget how the early adventist evangelist used to preach where it was the word of god the word of god the word of god that's where the power is but somehow how did all those idols end up all through the land of israel they had been neglecting the word that would not happen if we would be saturating ourselves with the word of god friends can you say amen and having a bible in your home is not a substitute for having the bible in your heart it says thy word i have a hid in my heart that i might not sin against thee i remember a cd brooks telling a story one time about this little girl that was helping her mother clean up with the duster and she liked using the feather duster and in the process she was dusting the coffee table that had this big family bible there she called to her mother and said mama whose book is this she called back from the kitchen honey that's god's book a little girl said don't you think we ought to give it back to him now nobody here uses it that's the way it is and a lot of families got the big family bible but nobody ever really reads it or we think we're going to survive fighting temptation with the devil all week long on the little bit we might get or might not get from the pastor once a week and i'm not trying to be critical of pastors i do pastor church and i'll just tell you right now i know that sometimes i fire blanks also and i worry about the flock if they're supposed to survive spiritually all week long on whatever i might happen to provide in that 45 minutes it's no wonder that we're easily being overcome or that we're losing the book in the house of the lord the bible is not like any other book first of all how are we saved we're saved by grace through faith would you like more faith where do you get faith romans chapter 10 verse 17 so then faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of god if you're going to make it through the last days friends we need more faith how do we get faith faith comes by hearing and hearing by the word of god the more that we hear and read the word of god it will strengthen our faith but we can get to the place where we take it for granted somehow we think being surrounded with religious things and christian titles is a substitute for really appreciating the sacredness of this blessed book the children of israel when they went through the wilderness god fed them he provided miraculous food six days a week i think one reason he gave it to him six days a week is not just because of the sabbath when it didn't come sabbath they realized that this was a supernatural event because it would always come six days a week but it would never come on sabbath and that would never happen naturally through nature except by god's design he wanted them to know do not take your bread for granted it is being provided by angels but did they get to where they took it for granted and did they get to where they started to complain and say man a man a man every day same old thing what's for breakfast man you know just i remember one time believe it or not i was so poor all i had left was rice and i found out a thousand different ways to cook rice you can fry your rice you can boil your rice you can eat it raw and for a treat eat it for breakfast with raisins that really does make a big difference little butter covers a multitude of scents put a little butter in that rice and salt a little sugar with your raisins it goes a long ways but you can get tired of rice rice rice even if it tastes good but if you're hungry there's a spanish proverb that says in effect hunger is the best sauce and if we hunger after that righteousness we start to appreciate it we can get to where we don't appreciate god's manna you know what they did they started to lust after the flesh pots of egypt why did god pour out his holy spirit on daniel shadrach meshach and abednego because they would not eat the babylonian food we got a lot of people in the church they've lost the book because they're eaten at another cafeteria they're eating the babylonian food they're lusting after the flesh pots of egypt by the way when the children of israel started doing that god withdrew his protection and serpents came in and bit them and many died why because they neglected the manna they ceased to appreciate the food that god had given them could that happen again could we get to where instead of dining on the divine word every day we're filling our minds with other things so clouded out now i'm just going to be as frank as i know how to be you want me to tell you the truth you sure yes you know one reason i think that there is a spiritual lethargy among god's people is because our minds our eyes our ears are being so filled with the programs and the things of the world that it has deluded the power of god's word or by comparison we think rice rice rice man a man a manner i want something exotic i want something spicy you can actually burn your taste buds where you don't taste anything but cayenne pepper after a while if that's all you ever eat and some people say well you know i just don't appreciate the bible the way i used to anymore and they don't know what the problem is but their minds are so fevered with the hyper stimulating programs on television the music that they might be listening to the literature that they're reading the dvds that they're watching that by comparison they look at the bible and they say man amen amen and they wonder why it just doesn't move them maybe we need to get rid of some idols seek after god and it might come alive you know if a person's got old limb burger cheese stuck on their mustache they can't smell the delicate fragrance of a flower anymore all the flowers smell like limb burger that applies to men too just kidding i wondered if you were listening and but really the illustration applies sometimes our senses have been damaged and they need time to heal you might need to take a break a permanent break would be better for most from the programming of the world so that you can appreciate the things of god you know i'm a little conflicted because i really believe in the power of television for reaching people you know we produce a lot of tv programs and amazing facts i believe in the power of radio i believe in the power of the written word television in and of itself is simply a medium to communicate audio and video information but the majority of the programming that people are watching and listening to unfortunately is not spiritual i'm praise the lord for the power of the press the first thing ever printed on a printing press was a bible but do you think most of the printing done in the world today is bibles no that medium is abused and if you can't control your television then you might want to tune it up with a sledgehammer or something what profit is it for you to go into that lake of fire having the finest digital system in the world you're better off making it into the kingdom with nothing but a transistor radio if that's a stumbling block for you and you know it is for a lot of people is this the truth friends i'm a pastor and i just know that the average christian is spending about 100 times more time listening to the gobbledygook that is being produced on one of a hundred different satellite channels that they might get now you know when i grew up they had three to pick from when i was young and you had to move the coat hanger to get them to come in you know what i'm talking about and it was a little more you know even though it was still worldly back then it was very subdued compared to the explicit graphic stuff is on television today do we think we're immune to those influences do we think that that's not going to affect us spiritually the values and the morals of the world are just going down down down what do you think happens to the church if we live in a culture like that at the same time so what do we do pastor doug fast you know there's more than one way to fast you might not just only fast from food and pray some of us would do well to do a fast from the programming of the world and pray and say lord i really want to take some time i'd like to appeal to you especially during these few days that we have to seek after god during this revival to say lord i'm going to turn off the television i'm going to turn off the secular influences and i want to spend some time in the word and i'm going to get on my knees and i'm going to spend extra time in prayer and i'm going to make a decision to open the bible and to start reading you don't know where to start start with the book of john i'll just give you a place pick your own place start with the gospel of john if you'd like and watch and see if god doesn't do something remarkable in your life there is inherent power in the word of god but the lord wants you to love him he's not going to force you to know him he's not going to force you to love him he said seek and you'll find if we're just sitting around and we're not making an effort to seek after god he doesn't promise you're going to find him knock it will be opened ask you'll receive there's to be an effort on our part in seeking after god and he promises if you do your search will be rewarded he says you'll search for me and you'll find me jeremiah chapter 29 verse 13. when you search for me with all of your heart how would you pray tonight if you knew you had one week left to live really i know that's sort of that's one of those questions you hate it when an evangelist uses that question it troubles you you say oh you're pulling the death card on me don't do that we don't want to think about that by the way in case you don't know we're all terminal what if you knew you had one more week would you pray differently we presume upon our time here i think right now if our eyes could be open we could see how close we are to the end we'd all spend a lot more time on our knees and in god's word trying to get to know the lord we want to have assurance that we are saved we'd want to have assurance that we know the lord and we'd want to be prepared to tell others about god right i say this everywhere i go it's very simple but it's very true god is love love is the most important thing it's the essence of who he is the purpose of life is that you might know god and his love and share god and his love you'll never be happy until you experience love for god with all of your heart and love for your neighbor most of us have severe chronic love problems amen we got problems loving god the way we should we love ourselves more we have problems loving our neighbor the way we should because we love ourselves more that's what the fallen nature is love for self is supreme the cross represents this love relationship and this love relationship jesus came down to show us how to love each other and to help us know who god is so we can love him you're not going to love somebody you don't know i mean we you know spiritualized and say you know i looked across the room and it was love at first sight and that's beautiful and romantic but i don't really believe that i think sometimes we might be attracted at first sight maybe the holy spirit might touch us on the shoulder and say that's the one for you but more times than not it's our lower nature that that gets our attention really you got to get to know a person to fall in love with him we don't even know what jesus looked like but can we love him it's because of who he is not what he looks like we put so much stock on the external instead of who is god the better you know the lord the more you'll love him the better you love him the better you'll serve him the more you love him the more of a pleasure it is to do his will well where does that all start he speaks to us through his word it's through his word we find out who he is the bible tells us that his word is truth it's the truth that sets us free john chapter 17 verse 17 sanctify them by your truth your word is truth and then of course jesus says in john 8 32 you'll know the truth and the truth will set you free how do you get christ on the inside he is the word the word became flesh as you read the bible he enters into your heart and into your life and he transforms you it really does work friends either the bible will keep you from sin or sin will keep you from the bible but we've got to take the time and make the effort to get to know him you've heard of the seven wonders of the world have you heard of the seven wonders of the word the word is wonderful here's what some of the seven wonders of the word are the word of god is wonderful in its origin it comes to us by divine inspiration it fills every test of criteria for its divine inspiration it's wonderful in its durability outlasting the opposition of its critics and surviving the attempts of enemies to eradicate it and exterminate the bible still the best-selling book it's wonderful in its results i've never seen anything that will change a person's life and give them supernatural power to be a new creature like the word of god it's wonderful in its harmony even though it's written over fifteen hundred years closer to 1600 years by 40 different authors on three different continents yet there is a uniform message in the word of god that complements every other part the bible is wonderful in its preservation it maintains its accuracy and reliability down through the centuries read by all classes of people i mean it doesn't matter whether it's kids there's part of the bible the little children can understand and then there's parts of the bible that challenge the greatest intellects of the world now i'm not an advocate of everything c.s lewis said but he was a pretty profound thinker and i've i've just been inspired by some of his observations it was interesting yesterday to stop there in oxford at the place and took a little picture where he would uh hang out and and teach had an incredible intellect brilliant guy the bible challenge minds like that and yet there are principles in there that are so easy that you can teach a four-year-old and they'll understand it no other book like that number seven it's wonderful in its language written largely by uneducated men yet the the most sublime literary book in the world when you think about some of the other great classics of history how much of the bible they copy i remember my poor brother they forced him to read the book moby dick he cried it was so big and then later in life i found this great sermon on jonah and i said wow this is an incredible quote where'd that come from it's in moby dick the language all through the book is drawn from the bible i mean the greatest writers they go back to the bible to look for their stories the stories of the bible you can't ever find a story in real life that's any better than the story of joseph i mean talk about the twists and turns in the book of esther there's nothing to match it greatest literary work seven wonders of the word god's word is a light do we need light in these last days friends to illuminate our path are we living in a dark world the bible is a light unto our feet and a lamp to our path psalm 119 verse 105. you know the parable of the 10 virgins that you find in matthew chapter 25 let me just check your bible knowledge what percentage of those virgins were sleeping before the bridegroom comes 100 percent some people say five no 100 were asleep so how does god prophesy the condition of the church just before jesus comes there's a uniform universal snore that you can hear so you're asking why do we need revival prophecy says we need it just before jesus comes and a message goes out just before jesus comes behold the bridegroom is coming go out to meet him and what do they do as they prepare to go out and meet him in the hotel room where i'm staying above the bed they've got one light switch that's different from the other light switches in that it is a dimmer switch i guess they make that so before you drop off the sleeve you can eyes are tired you can turn them down you could read a little bit they would let their lamps burn low when they were sleeping to conserve conserve the oil so if the lamp represents the word of god what kind of light is being utilized from the word of god just before jesus comes most of the churches no 100 percent their lamps are barely burning when they hear the message hey he's coming so there's a call to trim your lamp what is the lamp it's a light we need to spend time you've got to do something to trim your lamp have you ever seen one of those bible lamps got oil inside we'll talk about the holy spirit another night but uh i used to light my house with kerosene lamp way back up in the hills finally we got solar electric panels that's wonderful now but i remember and i was too cheap for kerosene we use diesel it works sure later we upgraded to a coleman lamp and you're supposed to use this special fuel we used unleaded gas it's cheaper but you used to have to monkey with the mantle or you take the wick and you have to clean off the wick you'd clean off the lamp because it would get blackened with soot and you could trim it up and you get maximum brightness out of it needed a little bit of attention to get it to illuminate to its maximum potential and you had to make sure and have fuel so how are we going to go about showing other people the way to the wedding feast if our lamps are barely burning have we maybe lost the book in the house of the lord i read about some of your heroes here in england who has a thomas cramer memorize the whole new testament can you imagine that we had a young man in our church in sacramento i think he was about 15 years old from india his father told me he's memorized the whole book of revelation i've been doing revelation seminars for 25 30 years now i haven't memorized the whole book of revelation i said really and we had him come up and people in the congregation said chapter 12. he thought for a moment and then just began to read through chapter 12 flawlessly i'm very proud of our son stephen his bible teacher one day said he'd give him extra credit if he could remember the 27th psalm and he just took it as a challenge in one night he's walking around the house he's saying parts of it he's coming back he said give me this part here dad print this out for me and one night he memorized the 27 psalm where he did it by memory the next day man i wish i had a brain like that you get older and it's just a little harder your hard drive starts skipping spots you know best time to memorize it is when you're young train up a child in the way he should go and so many of us we're neglecting the golden opportunities to impress the word of god on the minds of our children i just thought of a verse that i had printed out from moses you know what he says about this therefore deuteronomy 11 18 you shall lay up these words deuteronomy 11 18 through 20. lay up these words of mine in your heart and in your soul bind them for a sign on your hand they'll be as frontlets between your eyes i want to stop right there sign on your hand frontlets between your eyes does that sound familiar when you hear somebody say in the hand and in the forehead in the bible what do you automatically think of when you hear someone in the bible say in the hand and in the forehead people love when you're going to talk to them about the mark of the beast in the hand or in the forehead and everybody wants to know what is it i'm going to make sure i don't have the mark of the beast and i want some people think it's a tattoo or some rubber stamp or some bar code they all kinds of crazy theories about what the mark of the beast is and who the beast is and everybody thinks they're going to be saved by virtue of having this inside information on what the bad guy's up to but they miss what the real secret is to victory if you did not know about what the mark of the beast was but you do have the word of god in your hand and in your forehead you're home free because if you do have the word of god in your hand and as frontline's between your eyes that means in the forehead then you will recognize the counterfeit when it comes along and when you're told to bow down to the image you'll say no uh-uh word of god says don't do that you'll know and so we spend all our time studying what the problem is and we don't look at what the answer is i never did finish my verse he says these words shall be as a sign on your hand they'll be frontlets between your eyes you shall teach them to your children diligently teach them to your children speaking of them when you sit in your house when you walk by the way when you lie down evening worship when you rise up morning worship write them on the doorposts of your house and on your gates my mother became so exasperated at my brother and i she was a single parent because we want to brush our teeth we'd come home with these expensive dental bills and one day she took a permanent marker and she went through our rooms in our bathroom you open up the medicine cabinet in big bold letters my mother wrote brush your teeth you flip up the toilet seat brush your teeth i forget two or three other very prominent places where everywhere we turn we either brush your teeth brush your teeth brush your teeth brush your teeth i only wish she had done that with the word of god when i was growing up do you have morning worship in your family when you rise up when you lay down when you go out when you come in pray before you travel especially well i've seen your highways here those roundabouts they scare me half to death and someone doesn't know exactly where they're going they just keep going around until you fly out the other door so we need to just impress the word of god in our minds it's a light for our path first timothy chapter 4 verse 13 till i come give attention to reading give attention to it we need to make a conscious effort to read the word of god bible is not a sacred book in that it's going to glow in the dark if you sneak into your library at night shut all the lights out and say i wonder if the bible is going to glow it doesn't glow like that the bible will glow when it gets in your life it'll make you glow that's where the power of the word is it's food for the soul jeremiah chapter 15 verse 16 your words were found and i ate them your word was to me the joy and the rejoicing of my heart for i am called by your name o lord god of hosts again i like the way job puts it chapter 23 verse 12 i have not departed from his commandment of his lips i have treasured the words of his mouth more than my necessary food you know some people when they're traveling they're not going to forget to pack a snack but they might leave their bible and if you're in a hurry and you've got to get to work and you have to choose well i don't know i got to get some breakfast i mean after all you want to want to go to work and have low blood sugar or i've got to leave off reading the bible so i know you're going to think i'm a fanatic but think about it really if you're going to faint through weakness during the day which fainting is the most dangerous fainting physically or fainting spiritually do you really believe that what kind of priority does the bible have in your life this is jesus this is his word to you it's a love letter to you you know if you've got some soldier in a foreign field and separated from their sweetheart wife or girlfriend and uh you start getting real lonely when you're away from home for a long time i'll tell you you know doing evangelism i do what i do because i love the lord but i was just separated from karen and the boys for a month in australia lord blessed i loved being with the people there but don't you think you start missing your wife and i'll be here for about a week praise the lord for skype soldier gets a letter from his wife girlfriend think he reads that through one time does he say that sometimes they'll even read it read between the lines to see if there's any hidden message in there they might even put it up to the noses and say i wonder if she left any of her perfume smell on here and they'll sniff it and read it they'll want to read it to their friends they listen to what she bores them to death but listen to what my girlfriend said to me because it's exciting because you love the person do you love jesus do you hunger and thirst after righteousness nothing is going to ever satisfy you like the word of god it is bread for our souls man doesn't live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of god friends this really is angel food that god has given us there's a lot of critics out there that downplay the bible and they try to make a big deal about the parts of the bible they don't understand it's like mark twain said it's not the mysteries in the bible that trouble me it's the parts i do understand that calls me sleepless nights and you got your critics out there that will say well this is problem in the bible and this is the parent contradiction this apparent discrepancy and they'll focus on this microscopic percentage of scripture that might be difficult and there are some difficult passages i don't understand them all but that's not my problem my problem is i understand a lot more than i'm living i want to be like jesus so instead of making excuses about the parts we don't understand what about what you do understand we'll argue about how do you love your enemy what does that really mean we're not even loving our neighbor or our family the practical stuff the basic stuff the word is bread for our souls friends and especially now because it is bread god foretells i believe this is a prophecy about our day behold the days are coming says the lord god that i'll send a famine on the land not a famine for bread nor a thirst for water but of hearing the words of the lord men will wander from north to south east and west looking for the word of god and will not find it and here's a question i want you to think about is it possible to have a famine for the word of god when you've got an average of four or five bibles in every home can you still have a famine can you lose the book of god in the house of god that's almost inconceivable here they've got this great big edifice one of the wonders of the world was the temple of solomon and yet when they finally found this book they brought it to the king and they said you're never going to believe this king but we found we found the book of of moses in the church what happened here on our story as a result of that you may want to go back to second chronicles verse 18 then shapen the scribe told the king saying hilkiah the priest has given me a book it's the book of deuteronomy a book not the book and shaphen read it before the king now what happened when the king heard the words of the law that he tore his clothes you know what that represents repentance he humbled himself before god and he cried you know very few revivals have ever transpired except they're watered first with tears of repentance you know before mary was given that message of a risen lord she spent time weeping at jesus feet and before there is a ladder rain crop there is a ladder rain it's those tears of repentance that water the word of revival the king wept you know it says in deuteronomy exactly what was going to happen to the nation by the way when josiah had this experience the ten tribes to the north had been conquered by the assyrians he had already seen the fulfillment of these things moses went into great detail he says if you turn away from god he'll withdraw his protection you'll be surrounded by your enemies it'll get so bad that you'll resort to cannibalism extreme detail and now josiah is reading all this he said how come we didn't know these things it was all here in black and white god has warned us we've done the exact thing he told us not to do now here's a question question for you when jesus came the first time did his people the jews have bibles did the jewish people have scripture yes that's what i'm talking about they had scripture all the scripture existed up to that time yet did they recognize him when he came did they misunderstand the prophecies were they wrapped up with some traditions so that when the messiah the whole substance of the book was about jesus when he came they didn't know him could history repeat itself so that we've got bibles but we don't know about jesus we're not reading the word we're not in the truth there'll be no shortage of wolves that are going to enter into the flock in the last days scattering the sheep causing problems that's why we need to build on the rock of his word you know christ said who's going to survive the coming storm he that hears these words of mine and does them he's the one who will survive you know as the king read this he tore his clothes and it basically brought about a great revival you read in verse 29 the king sent and he gathered all the elders of judah and jerusalem and the king went up to the house of the lord with all the men of judah and the inhabitants of jerusalem and the priests and the levites and all the people great and small important non-important young and old and the king stood and it says and he read in their hearing all the words of the book of the covenant which had been found in the house of the lord how much of the word do we need to know all scripture is given by inspiration of god this is all about jesus and the king stood in his place and made a covenant before the lord to follow the lord his god to keep his commandments and his testimonies his statutes with all of his heart with all of his soul to perform the words of the covenant you know it's not just hearing but to perform are we going to be just hears of the word is god calling us to be doers of the word and he made all who were present with him in judah and benjamin to take their stand for it and you know god delivered the people during the time of josiah because they took a stand for it there was a great revival and there was rejoicing because they had returned to the book of god you know ultimately why this is so important the word of god is telling us about jesus the bible is revealing a person the whole purpose of the plan of salvation is that we might be transformed into his image second chronic uh second corinthians chapter 3 verse 18 but we all with unveiled face beholding as an emir the glory of the lord are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory as by the spirit of the lord by beholding we are transformed into his image you know what a christian is a follower of christ how do we become christ-like our souls are like photographic plates and as we turn our eyes on jesus as we look into his word this is where jesus reveals himself it transforms us you know one of the most incredible photographs that you could see and you can look at it for free it's on the hubble website it's called the uh the deep space the hubble deep space photograph what they did back in 1995 after they got the hubble tuned up they aimed this very very the most expensive telescope in the world to a piece of nothingness in space they're wondering is there anything there now because space is so dark and if you know anything about photography when it's dark you need more what more light or you need a longer exposure you're listening if it's dark and if you don't have flash you tell everybody don't move you hold the camera down you leave the shutter open a long time and it'll capture more light as it stays in one position and it focuses they took a piece of space where there was a whole lot of nothing they said a matter of fact we're going to find the most nothing spot in the sky we can find and they did a very expensive experiment because that telescope using it in the staff that they have to man it it's a big endeavor they found a piece of the sky if you take a dime i don't know what the equivalent is in your currency but it's about that big you take a dime hold that now 75 feet away there we go again i don't know what that would be in meters hold that 40 meters away that's how big the piece of sky was that they took a picture of ten days aiming into the darkness they then got this photograph this piece of sky that they thought was full of nothing they found out has 1 500 observable galaxies the galaxies that god made have as many as 200 million flaming suns in them and that means if you travel 186 000 miles per second it's going to take you a minimum of 2.5 billion years to get to the first part of what they saw in that photograph god made all of that but they had to aim that camera a long time to capture that little bit of light we're living in a dark world and you're going to have to really focus on jesus if you want to capture his image on your soul friends you need to fix your eyes on jesus and the way we're going to do that is by perpetually looking into his word and it transforms us you become like what you look at would you like to know about christ jesus said in the gospel of john 5 39 search the scriptures for in them you think you have eternal life which is true but ultimately these are they that testify of me you will not be saved unless you know jesus how you get to get to know him by his word friends again luke chapter 24 verse 27 when jesus rose from the dead you know why he appeared for 40 more days among the disciples that he might teach him the word that he might show them from the word that he was the fulfillment of all the prophecies and it says beginning at moses and all the prophets he expounded unto them in all the scriptures the things concerning himself the bible is about jesus friends you know not far from here uh another famous preacher spurgeon 19 years old he was given his first church by the time he was 20 he was pastor of what grew into the metropolitan church and it created a great revival and he was committed to preaching the word every week church just continued to grow until ultimately i think it seats 6 000 he'd have several services he'd preach sometimes to 10 000 a week without amplification no television screens no special effects just preaching the word to the people and again i may not agree with everything martin luther said or john wesley said or or spurgeon said but these were men of god and they knew their bibles friends one of the most eloquent things i've ever seen about the bible was written by spurgeon it's not a devotional anybody can read it i don't know if words move you the way they move me my mother was a lyricist so i think about words but by the way the reference if you want to read this it's online it's free spurgeon's morning and evening june 10 and i think this is the evening reading jesus christ is the alpha and omega of the bible he is the constant theme of its sacred pages from the first to the last they testify of him at the creation we at once discern him as the one sacred trinity we catch a glimpse of him in the promise of the woman's seed we see him typified in the ark of noah we walk with abraham as he sees the messiah's day we dwell in the tents of isaac and jacob feeding upon the gracious promise we hear the venerable israel jacob talking of shiloh and the numerous types of the law we find the redeemer abundantly foreshadowed prophets and kings priests and preachers all look one way they all stand as the cherubs did over the ark desiring to look within to read the mystery of god's great appropriation still even more manifestly in the new testament we find our lord the one pervading subject it's not an ignot here and there or dust of gold thinly scattered but here in the new testament you stand on a solid floor of gold for the whole substance of the new testament is jesus christ crucified even its closing sentence is bejeweled with the redeemer's name we should always read the scripture in this light it's telling us about jesus we should consider the word to be a mirror into which christ looks down from the heaven and we see him looking into it we see his face reflected as in a glass darkly it's true but still in such a way as to be a blessed preparation for that day when we'll see him face to face this volume the bible contains jesus letters to us perfumed by his love these pages are the garments of our king they all smell of myrrh and aloes and cassia scripture is the royal chariot in which jesus rides the scriptures are the swaddling bands of the holy child jesus unroll them and you will find your savior the quintessence of the word of god is christ this is all about jesus friends i heard one time where spurgeon was preaching it was at the um it's not the it's a crystal palace that they had years ago largest audience that he preached to no amplifier 22 000 people he went in early to test the acoustics and he quoted that verse the blood of jesus christ will cleanse the world well actually it was a verse i apologize he quoted the verse behold the lamb of god that takes away the sin of the world he said acoustics sound good and he left years later he met a man on his deathbed who said i was working as a custodian there not a christian and i only heard that one verse and it kept echoing over and over in my mind and i gave my heart to jesus there's power in the word the whole book is full of promises like that it's full of power but you must reach out and ask you must seek you must knock so my appeal to you both now for you every day and during this series in a special way is to read your bibles friends if we ever needed to know this blessed book it's now amen they're available a thousand different versions online but we've got to read it is that your desire friends would you like to say pastor doug i want to pray right now that i can know the lord better and i'm going to commit by his grace to reading his word to getting to know god is that your prayer friends who are watching can i pray for you right now [Music] loving father in heaven help us to appreciate the incredible treasure that you've given us in the bible help us lord by your grace to give us the power and the resolve to spend time in your word every day and we pray that there will be a revival among your people pour out your spirit bless this event and may we know jesus better we pray in his name amen

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Length: 61min 13sec (3673 seconds)

Published: Sun Sep 19 2021