Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Good morning. 9:30.
[00:00:07] Good morning. If I have not had the opportunity to meet you, my name is Michael Fueling and I am the lead pastor. And before we jump into the message, two quick things for you.
[00:00:18] If you are like here on a semi regular basis, it would probably shock you to know the amount of volunteer hours it takes to make the life and rhythm of Village Church.
[00:00:32] What I'm about to tell you is not pastor math, although you might be tempted to think it is. Our staff do less than 1% of all of the work day in, day out, week in and week out that it takes to really build and to love this spiritual family and community.
[00:00:50] The amount of meals and phone calls and prayer and engagement and small groups and hospital visitations and you name it, it's actually unbelievable how many thousands and thousands of hours of investment happen in our volunte.
[00:01:04] And so there's also another thing kind of happening which is a handful of you are newer to the church, you're like, I think this is my church home.
[00:01:13] Maybe you're figuring out you're gonna jump into alpha or a rooted group or a community group, but you also wanna serve. And so one of the things that we do at Village Church, it's called attend one, serve one.
[00:01:24] If you're not serving throughout the week, we have so many needs on a Sunday morning. For example, if you are an extrovert or you like, you can hide the fact that you don't like people, we have greeters and we have a welcoming team. If you're a barista and you make coffee, we have a cafe team. And if you don't know how to do it, they will train you. It's actually a great opportunity to learn if you are security oriented. You may not know it, but there is security all throughout the church all morning long making sure that we are safe and we have access to awesome first response for anything that could happen.
[00:02:02] Production, behind the scenes, worship. And then really the biggest need that we need is serving, leading and loving and discipling our hundreds of kids back in kids ministry. And so if you are looking and you're like, I really wanna make a difference, I wanna serve, I wanna encourage you. You can go to vcob.org services, you can go to the hub. If you have a phone, there's a QR code. If you forget all of that, come talk to anybody up front and we'll help you find access to that. But we would love to give you the opportunity to jump in and serve. And there's a whole bunch of people who are just gonna be. So you might be only able to serve once a month, and that's awesome. Twice a month. That's great. You may not also know this, but there's a bunch of people who serve who are here kind of half the morning or all morning long, just serving and making a difference. It's actually quite a bit of fun, and we have a great time. Maybe you like to make food. Guess what? All the food is made, run and served by volunteers. Anybody who wants to eat as much sugar as you want, we're committed to defeating you.
[00:03:06] Second, quick announcement. I'm from Detroit.
[00:03:10] Yep.
[00:03:11] Good.
[00:03:13] Regarding football, it's been challenging, and I just want to say to my Green Bay Packer fans, I love you and I'm sorry, but I am second a Bears fan. So. Go Bears. All right.
[00:03:26] If you have a Bible, would you open it up to Deuteronomy 27?
[00:03:30] And we are finishing the book of Deuteronomy. Now, as you turn your Bibles there, I want to talk about secrets.
[00:03:37] I found, as I've had the opportunity to listen to a lot of people, that most everyone has secrets. And some secrets are good. Some of these secrets are just between you and the Lord, or they're between you and your spouse, or between you and a friend or two.
[00:03:52] These are sacred secrets. They're good things.
[00:03:56] Some secrets are not good.
[00:03:58] And most people work really, really hard to keep their dark secrets hidden.
[00:04:04] For some of you, you're trying to keep them hidden from your parents or hidden from your spouse or hidden from your friends. Some of you your neighbors, Some of you your boss.
[00:04:15] And the only way that someone finds out about your dark secret is if you slip up or you confess. And here's the deal. I think if you're being honest, most people hate their dark secrets.
[00:04:30] And the reason you hate them is because you feel like you're a slave to them.
[00:04:35] And most people would give anything to be free from these. And I just wanna encourage you.
[00:04:41] You and I were not designed to have secret, sinful lives and then at the same time to flourish spiritually. And I know that this is what most of you want. You want to flourish spiritually. But when you have these dark, secret, sinful lives and you're trying to flourish spiritually, it's like two steps forward, five steps back, seven steps forward, three steps back. You're forward, you're back. And it's this constant battle. The two them work against each other in a very powerful way. I'd like to give you maybe a little bit of insight into the fueling home For a moment, in the fueling home, we 100% reject the notion of digital privacy for our children.
[00:05:18] My wife and I, she can pick up my phone, I can pick up her phone. And you might be thinking, what does this have to do with dark secrets? Because digital privacy is the number one avenue for dark secrets.
[00:05:28] The Bible doesn't talk about iPhones and androids. The Bible doesn't talk about computers.
[00:05:32] And what is this, an iPad. Okay. But these are the number one access point for the vast majority of us in this room who have dark secrets.
[00:05:44] So as long as you live in our house and as long as Bri and I pay the bills, mom and I, we have full, total, complete, 100% access to every digital device that you own. No questions asked. And when you go to bed, those devices, they go to bed downstairs. And we, and we use the freedom to look through everything. Digital privacy in the feeling home does not exist.
[00:06:08] Now the reason this is is because my children were not designed by God to be able to carry the weight and the burden of dark secrets, let alone digital dark secrets.
[00:06:19] And this is not what God wants for any of us. So Deuteronomy chapter 27.
[00:06:24] This is Moses last message to the people of Israel. He's going to die. They're going to go into the promised land.
[00:06:31] As they into the promised land, here's what's going to happen. They're going to fight two battles. One is in the city of Jericho and the other is in the city of AI and they're going to win both of these battles. And when they win, they will have complete control over who lives and who dies.
[00:06:52] They will have complete control over all of the land's resources. They will have complete control over their wealth, their agriculture, their gold, their silver, everything. And they will have complete control over their women.
[00:07:05] And they will also have complete control over their carved demon God worship idols and also the high places where they would go worship these demon gods.
[00:07:17] And when they go into this land and they conquer these cities, they are going to have the freedom and the ability to do evil and unbiblical things, just like the people who lived in the land before them. And they're gonna have the ability to do this and to so anticipation of this reality. Deuteronomy 27. God is going to subject the nation of Israel to a very strange ritual.
[00:07:42] It's gonna be a ritual I'm guessing, that they're never going to forget. And it is a ritual that is designed by God to help protect and prevent them from dark, secret, sinful lives.
[00:07:55] So they go into the land, they fight Jericho, they fight AI. And then when they're done with these battles, they're naturally gonna find themselves in a valley. And in this valley, on one side of the valley is Mount Gerizim. And Mount Gerizim, if you look at it, it is lush, it is green, it is fertile. And then the other side of the valley is gonna be Mount Ebal, and this is gonna be the complete opposite. Mount Ebal is going to be rocky and it is going to be barren. And then between them is going to be this large valley that is going to serve as a natural amphitheater so people can speak. And you'll see that this will become essential for the ritual. So this ritual starts in Deuteronomy 27:11. Here's what it says. Moses says. It says, that day, Moses charged the people, saying, when you have crossed over the Jordan, So this is gonna be a future event. He's telling them what's gonna happen. This actually takes place in Joshua 8. So if you wanna read this event unfold says, when you have crossed over the Jordan, these shall stand on Mount Gerizim to bless the people. Simeon, Levi, Judah, Issachar, Joseph, Benjamin. These are half of the tribes of Israel. So all the people, half of them are going to go over to Mount Gerizim. Verse 13. And these shall stand on Mount Ebal for the curse. Reuben, Gad, Asher, Zebulun, Dan, and Naphtali. And then the Levites shall declare to all the men of Israel in a loud voice, okay, so the 12 tribes are divvied up. Six tribes, they go to Mount Gerizim. Six tribes go to Mount Ebal. And these two mountains represent two choices.
[00:09:32] Mount Gerizim is going to represent the choice to follow and to obey God. For those who choose this path, what awaits them is going to be life and spiritual flourishing or the blessing.
[00:09:48] Mount Ebal, on the other hand, is going to represent a different choice. This is going to represent the choice of to rebel against God, to reject him and to disobey his word. And if you choose this path, what awaits for you is death, barrenness, and destitution, or the curse.
[00:10:06] Now, there's a pattern that Jewish and Christian scholars have noticed in a list of curses that are in Deuteronomy 27. And let me just summarize the pattern so that you kind of know before we jump into them says this. Each curse in Deuteronomy 27 is connected to a secret sin that people and Families will be tempted to conceal.
[00:10:31] All right, verse 15.
[00:10:32] After they've crossed into the land, after they've won their first two battles, when they find themselves in this valley, the Levites will stand in the middle of the valley between these two mountains, and they will declare to the tribes on Mount Ebal in a loud voice, verse 15.
[00:10:49] Cursed be the man who makes a carved or cast image, and by the way, an abomination to the Lord. In case you're curious, a thing made by the hands of a craftsman, you might be thinking, okay, Pastor Michael, I've paid meticulous attention to every sermon you've given. Mesmerizing. I know.
[00:11:07] And we know this already. We know this already. No idols, no exceptions. We get it.
[00:11:14] Why here again, verse 15 goes on and it clarifies, cursed be the man who makes a carved or cast metal image and sets it up in secret.
[00:11:27] God knows something about human nature.
[00:11:32] If we believe we can get away with it, we are all prone to sinning secretly. At this point, what I want to do is say, amen. I don't want you to like self condemn yourself in that moment.
[00:11:45] But we also see that God loves us so much that he does not want us to live under the burden and the weight of secret, dark sins.
[00:11:57] And so, knowing their proclivity to sin, secretly, God adds something really vital to the ritual.
[00:12:05] So the Levites will declare a number of curses. But at the end of each curse, all of the people on Mount Ebal have to respond with one word, the last sentence of verse 15.
[00:12:17] And all the people shall answer and say, what's that word? Village?
[00:12:21] Amen. Literally, truly. Let me just translate what they're actually saying.
[00:12:26] We accept the consequences should we choose to rebel. And should we do so, we are inviting divine curses on us and our family.
[00:12:39] I mean, this will make you think twice before you rebel. In a new land, we can imagine every family individually gets up and they father, mother, kids, whatever, grandkids, fine. And you get up. And now you have to say, if we engage in dark, secret sins technologically, we invoke divine curses on our family for generations to come. Would that make you think twice? Or before every single test in school, the teacher says, everybody stand up. We're now going to invoke divine curses on ourselves. Should any of you cheat, it'll make you think twice. Now, as we, as we look to at these dark, secret sins that Israel was tempted by, we have an opportunity to look into our own heart, into our own life, into our own secrets. And my hope is that One of two things happens. Number one, if there are dark secrets that only the Lord knows about, that they're just overwhelming your soul or burdening you, my prayer is that you would have a clear next step to overcoming them. But my hope is also that as you kind of see the panorama of all these things that the nation of Israel is gonna be tempted to, there might be something that comes up in the upcoming weeks, months, years in your life, and you're gonna be in a moment where you are gonna have an opportunity to engage in a dark, secret sin. And my hope is that you remember that sermon that Pastor Michael gave that one time, that this is not what God wants for you. God does not want you to be burdened with dark secret sins. He wants you to be free.
[00:14:06] He wants you to be unburdened by these things.
[00:14:10] So for each of the categories, what I'm going to do is I want to share a few modern equivalents. And this is not going to be like expansive. It's just going to be a few examples of what this might look like today to maybe help you understand or remember things in your own life that might be dark secrets. So modern equivalents for secret idolatry, dependence on astrology, tarot manifestation practices, or spiritualism.
[00:14:38] And if you've kind of paid attention a little bit, you probably know that the word of God doesn't support these. So you do these things secretly.
[00:14:45] Another one is engaging with spirit guides, psychics and the like, or mixing scripture with chakra or energy flow teaching. And if you don't know what that is, praise God. Avoid it. It's dumb. Calling the Holy Spirit the universe or divine energy and getting into this new age mumbo jumbo where God is one and one is God and all is God and God is all. It's just not what the Bible teaches.
[00:15:06] Before we move to the next curse, I want to just bring clarity to one important thing, lest your brain get distracted. When we use the word curse, we are not referring to witchcraft.
[00:15:16] What we are actually referring to is the God imbued design of human life, that when you engage in things that are good and holy, the result is blessing. And when you engage in willful disobedience or rebellion against God, what God has done is he has put into the rhythm of the universe that when disobey his word that negative things happen. And this is called the cursing. So this is not witchcraft. All right, the next category is verse 16. Disgracing your parents. Verse 16. Cursed be anyone who dishonors his father or his Mother and all the moms and dads in the room said amen. Okay? So when we use the word dishonor, we have a pretty low bar for this. So what he's not talking about is like, you know how your kids kind of attitude, I don't wanna do the dishes. I don't wanna do this. It's not what this is actually probably referring to a better word that would capture the weight of this is the word disgrace.
[00:16:12] So to ease your comfort, this is not about bad attitudes. In fact, Old Testament case law communicates very clearly that these are very, very significant rebellious acts done against God and a mother and father. And you might be asking, okay, I thought this was about secret stuff. And this is because here's how this could unfold.
[00:16:35] You have a mom and dad who have a son or daughter in open rebellion, in violation. It's so bad that it's in violation against Old Covenant Law. And they are obligated to turn their child in because of the way the child is acting. And then mom and dad say, I'm not gonna do that. This secret, this stays in the house. And every single mom and dad understand intuitively the pressure to keep this secret.
[00:17:05] And here's one of the things that God wants. God wants the nation to be strong. And for the nation to be strong, families need to be strong. And for families to be strong, the kids need to be in line. Because what happens when kids learn to respect and honor their mother and father? This is where they learn to respect every other authority in life. You'll see a pattern. When a kid is disobedient and disrespectful to their mother and father, they are generally disrespectful to most, most authority in their life. And so what God is establishing in the home is a rhythm that will protect these children for the rest of their lives, and a rhythm that will make sure that the nation is strong and stable. And so this idea of children being in open rebellion against God and making their parents lives absolute hell and misery is not going to be tolerated under Old Covenant Law.
[00:17:52] And God is teaching them in this ritual.
[00:17:55] God sees everything that happens.
[00:17:57] And just because your extended family or your neighbors or your best friends don't see it, even the things that happen in your home, God sees everything. Here's some modern equivalents.
[00:18:09] Using your parents financially, but treating them with contempt in private.
[00:18:15] Cutting off parents not for actual safety, but to avoid accountability or worse, because your LGBTQ aligned community demands it. If you don't know what I mean, praise God. And if you know, you know, making your parents life miserable with your intentional rebellion.
[00:18:32] Alright, the next category is in verse 17. This is secret theft.
[00:18:37] It says this Cursed be anyone who moves his neighbor's landmark.
[00:18:42] And all the people shall say, say it with me, Ville Church. Amen.
[00:18:46] So one of the first disputes that you're gonna have in this new land is gonna be about territory. Who lives where, who gets what land. And so here is the temptation. You might not be thrilled with your land allocation. And so in the dead of night you go and you move the landmarks so that you have the more prosperous land, or you get rid of the land that you don't like and nobody can prove it. And so in this new land, we don't steal from our neighbors. We don't do this quietly. Because God hears and God sees everything. Here's some modern equivalents.
[00:19:19] Manipulating contracts to gain advantage over less informed people. Anybody ever felt like that's been done to you.
[00:19:26] Exploiting legal loopholes to take what isn't morally yours businesses. Inflating fees while hiding them in the fine print. There are a million ways to defraud somebody, and I guarantee every one of us in this room has been defrauded multiple times. But amongst the people of God, it's not gonna be so. And God knows how you got that money. God knows how you got that asset. God knows how you got that resource. He sees everything.
[00:19:55] Verse 18. Here's another category. Oppressing the vulnerable.
[00:19:59] Cursed be anyone who leads a blind, who misleads a blind man on the road. And all the people shall say amen. Who misleads a blind man on the road. But you're gonna start to, as these curses unfold, see the utter level of evil in these Canaanite tribes. Cursed be anyone who perverts the justice due to the sojourner, the fatherless and the widow. And the people shall say amen.
[00:20:25] These are the most poor, vulnerable or legally helpless in society.
[00:20:34] They are unable to defend themselves.
[00:20:38] And especially when you think about the case of the blind man, you could do whatever you want to take to mislead to. Maybe you just had a bad day, you want to take out all your energy on him. Maybe you're just a bully and there is no way for that man to prove who did what because he can't see. It's a modern equivalent. Using wealth and connections to legally silence the poor that you have harmed.
[00:21:01] Landlords, exploiting the poor or vulnerable for gain.
[00:21:06] Taking advantage of elderly people. Financially misleading someone new to faith for personal gain. Amongst the People of God, these kind of secret things to promote ourselves at the cost of others we don't do because God sees and God hears. And so the people stand and they say, if we do these things, may the curses be on us and our family.
[00:21:28] The next clump of examples are all sexual in nature. And so I'll kind of give some modern equivalents at the end.
[00:21:36] And in case you don't know, each one of these have disastrous legal consequences under the old covenant. Like, when you understand the consequences for these, you'll see why. These are secret things done and closed doors that you don't want anybody to find out about. Verse 20.
[00:21:54] Cursed be anyone who lies with his father's wife because he has uncovered his father's nakedness. And all the people shall say, please say Amen. Amen. Okay, so primarily this is referring to somebody who is not your birth mother, just to be clear. But does it apply to your birth mother as well? The answer is yes. Verse 21 is ugly. And this is going to illustrate the level of pure evil in this land.
[00:22:17] Cursed be anyone who lies with any kind of animal. And all the people shall say amen. Animals cannot defend themselves. And just because the culture you live in promotes some kind of evil, doesn't mean that we get to engage that even if no one ever finds out. I hope you find that disgusting. Verse 22.
[00:22:36] Cursed be anyone who lies with his sister, whether the daughter of his father or the daughter of his mother. And all the people shall say amen. Probably here referring to half siblings, primarily.
[00:22:47] Verse 23. This is the last sexual one. Cursed be anyone who lies with his mother in law. And all the people shall say Amen. So what these lands did is they offered complete sexual freedom where no one would publicize your.
[00:23:04] And you can kind of just hear like the rationale because we hear this today, but like, no one got hurt.
[00:23:10] No one has to know.
[00:23:12] What happens in Philistine stays in Philistine. What happens in Moab stays in Moab. And this is the kind of the thing that would tempt them. Like, these are gonna be secrets. Nobody's gonna find out. And God's warning them, don't even play the game.
[00:23:26] Because the moment you engage in these, you're in illegal behavior. And now you have to keep these things.
[00:23:32] Your soul was not made for these kind of dark secrets. And what God's trying to do is build a nation of people with pure hearts, trying to build a nation that is holy, not corrupt.
[00:23:44] And so he's like, I want more for you. I Want you to be a part of a nation where you and the nation can flourish spiritually. So modern equivalence sexualizing what God has created is non sexual, paying for sexuality, digital or otherwise.
[00:24:01] Engaging in forbidden sexual categories. Familial gender species, celebrating or supporting immoral sexual categories. This is from homosexuality to polyamorous relationships and everything in between.
[00:24:16] Engaging in sexual activity Sexuality outside of God's design and the Lord's like.
[00:24:23] Remember I see all of this and here's what the people of Israel are saying. If we fall prey to these sexual sins, we take on ourselves and our family. The curses allotted in God's word.
[00:24:40] The next two are about secret murder. And you might be thinking to yourself, I don't have any intention to kill anybody. I've heard a lot of stories and this is far more applicable than I think people sometimes realize.
[00:24:52] Cursed be verse 24. Anyone who strikes down his neighbor where in secret.
[00:24:58] And all the people shall say Amen. Verse 25. Cursed be anybody who takes a bribe to shed innocent blood. And all the people shall say Amen. Some modern equivalents enabling destructive addictions or selling drugs, corporate or institutional decisions, knowingly costing lives, paying others to do harm while staying clean. And God wants them to remember. God hears everything and he sees everything.
[00:25:25] And these kind of secret things, we don't do them because our soul is not made to carry this weight.
[00:25:32] And the people that we live with are not made. This is not the way the community is made to function. God is doing something fundamentally different. He's creating a holy people.
[00:25:41] Finally, verse 26. This is the catch all.
[00:25:44] Each command we just declared. Let's double down on our commitment. Cursed be anyone who does not confirm the words of this law by doing them. And all the people shall say Amen. I have two. So what's for you?
[00:25:58] Number one.
[00:26:00] God loves you so much that he wants you to be free from sexual or from secret. Well, sexual, but yes, secret sentences.
[00:26:13] Listen, if you feel exposed right now, it's probably not before me or the person sitting next to you. It's probably before God.
[00:26:22] His aim is not to humiliate or to shame you.
[00:26:28] His aim is to invite you out of hiding.
[00:26:32] I think one of the most courageous and difficult choices someone can make is to choose to commit to a life of integrity in the quiet places.
[00:26:47] Most of us have chosen a life of some level of integrity in the public places because there's a lot to lose when you do it in the public places.
[00:26:55] But it is a totally different decision to say in the places where no one sees in my mind. And when I'm alone, I will choose to fight for integrity.
[00:27:07] Nobody will be perfect at this. And thank God for the blood of Christ who offers us forgiveness no matter what we have fallen into. But this commitment that even when I fall into the moment, I kind of get my senses back to say I am going to live a life of integrity in the quiet places. Now, I am personally very thankful that we do not live in a time where the consequences for these. We don't live under Old Covenant Law, where we do not have to live and experience the legal ramifications for secret sins. Ah, you could give me an amen to that one, because half of us would be dead.
[00:27:43] There is a principle, though, in the New Covenant that I think is really important. And if you've been around a little bit, you probably heard me talking about this. But it's a simple principle. We reap what we sow.
[00:27:53] And there's this wonderful line in scripture, and it goes like this. If you sow the wind, you will reap the whirlwind. And here's how this principle plays out.
[00:28:03] If you sow a little bit of rebellion, God has designed the soul and the world so that the harvest is 10x.
[00:28:14] So you can do this. Now, here's the deal. Harvest doesn't come till later. Correct?
[00:28:19] And so immediately, all you get is the harvest of the joy of whatever secret sin you're doing.
[00:28:27] But inevitably, the harvest will be the 10x whirlwind. And so this is the rhythm that God has put into the world. You can sow the wind, but inevitably, and just at the right time, you will reap the whirlwind. And the reason God does this is to teach us and to train us that when we live in the consequences, the whirlwind of our sin, that the next time this thing comes around, we say, I am not gonna sow the wind anymore because the whirlwind is excruciating and painful.
[00:28:58] There is a better way, and let me just share them with you. Choose now to have no secret sins. Like, if you're in a place, it's probably because you're younger. But if you're in a place and you don't have a dark, secret sin that you were just praying nobody finds out about, choose now.
[00:29:19] And future you is gonna be so thankful, because the older you get, the harder it is to get rid of secret sins. Number two. Choose now. You might already be in some things, you might already have some stuff, but you can choose now to stop engaging in secret Sins. Number three, choose now to repent and apologize to the appropriate people so you can be free from dark secrets.
[00:29:47] Number four, get great counsel if things are complicated so you can be wise. You may not be aware of this, but something you should know is that if you have a pastor in your life, and there's a bunch of us at village church, if you have a counselor or a therapist, you are allowed to tell us whatever is on your brain. And we legally can't tell anybody else unless you're going to harm yourself or harm them.
[00:30:11] And so it's a great opportunity to be able to get wisdom and guidance.
[00:30:16] I think most people have a good friend that they can sit down with and say, I have to unload this secret. Would you give me wisdom to help me figure out the next right thing to do so that I can be free?
[00:30:30] Because this secret is stopping the thing I want, which is I want to flourish spiritually with the Lord. So at number two, in God's kindness, he commanded that blood be spilled on the cursed mountain. Now, my guess is that 98% of you have never, ever heard the story of Mount Ebal, Mount Gerizim, and the curses. Okay?
[00:30:52] Which means you probably have not studied the nuances of this text, which is why I'm here. But the great thing about this text is that God does something really interesting. In verses six and seven, an altar is commanded to be built on Mount Ebal. That's the Mountain of curse.
[00:31:10] And on this altar, God commanded two kinds of sacrifices.
[00:31:14] The first is a burnt offering, which represents repentance and atonement of confessed sins.
[00:31:25] So when you would give a burnt offering, you would be repenting and confessing sins, and this would be a sacrifice for your sins in your place.
[00:31:37] Then after this is what you'd be saying. With the burnt offering, I belong wholly to God, and my life is offered entirely to him. And in the burnt offering, this entire animal would be consumed.
[00:31:50] The second offering commanded is a peace offering. And the peace offering celebrates restored fellowship after you have confessed and repented. So by making the peace offering, you're saying this because of my repentance. We are now at peace and we can rejoice together. This is what I love.
[00:32:09] God knew in advance that the people were gonna mess this up.
[00:32:13] And so what God did in advance is he gave them an avenue to actually be forgiven from their dark, secret sins. And God is proclaiming that even for your darkest sins, there is atonement, forgiveness.
[00:32:32] There is a substitute sacrifice that will take your sins for you in your place. Now, here's what I think is just striking. So in human courts, if you break the law, you're going to have to deal with the legal consequences. And if you look at the judge and say, but I'm sorry, the judge doesn't care, right? So by and large, you do the crime. What do you do? You gotta do the time. It's interesting, in the divine court, it's a little bit different because God actually does know the heart.
[00:32:59] And so in the divine court, you can be 100% guilty of the crime, but if your heart is truly repentant, you can be actually fully and completely forgiven.
[00:33:11] I think it'd be just helpful at this point just to define repentance, because I think some of you are like, I want to be forgiven. What does it mean to repent? Repentance is a few things.
[00:33:22] It's a big word, but it means true sorrow for sin.
[00:33:27] Are you actually sorry for your sin?
[00:33:30] And then if you're truly repentant, there is full intent to change. It could be the way you think or the way you live.
[00:33:38] But part of repentance isn't just saying, I'm sorry, and then I'm going back and do what I wanted to. When you are repentant, you are sorry for what you've done. And there is an intention to actually change things. And then repentance, actual repentance, there is some kind of movement to change. Now, don't get me wrong, if you're ever trying to repent of something, it's really challenging always. Especially if it's a dark, secret sin. I get it.
[00:34:01] And you're probably never gonna be able to fully, perfectly repent every single time. Like, you're gonna struggle. Part of the process of repentance is the struggle.
[00:34:09] But it appears that the Lord, what he's looking for is, are you sorry? Are you intent on changing? And are you willing to move in the direction of change, understanding that it's gonna be imperfect, it's gonna be flawed. And when the Lord sees a repentant heart, what he offers is immediate forgiveness.
[00:34:27] And guys, that is really, really great news. So if you're a believer, you've trusted in Christ, you came to Christ and you told him, I am sorry for my sin.
[00:34:37] And in your heart, you had intention to shift your life and your mind in a different direction, and you took this initial step. When God sees that kind of repentance and you can't come to him and say, I am repentant, I believe in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus, his offer to you is forgiveness. Now, here's what's interesting. Satan himself, he believes in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. He has zero repentance. He has zero sorrow for his sin. Do you see the difference? There's a whole bunch of people who acknowledge that Jesus is God and they're a sinner. But for forgiveness to happen, what there has to be is actually this spirit of repentance. I'm sorry, I want to do different. God help me. I'm gonna take a motion to you and believe in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. If you're a believer, you've done that. If you are not a believer, if you are not a believer. I just. I wanna make this as simple as possible.
[00:35:25] Are you sorry for your sins?
[00:35:29] Are you willing to change like you want to change? You probably know you can't do it on your own, but you're like, God help me, I want to change.
[00:35:37] And are you willing to take that movement, that first step to change? That first step is going before God, owning your sin and asking to help you and telling him that you believe that Jesus is your God and that he died for your sins on the cross. Great news for you. God would love to forgive you of your dark sins. And I want you to think about this, this notion. People say this too much to me.
[00:36:00] I don't know that God could forgive me for what I've done.
[00:36:03] Did you guys see this list of secret sins, by the way? I'm sorry, some of those are disgusting.
[00:36:08] If the blood of Christ can cover that, I think he's got you.
[00:36:11] I think the blood of Christ can cover you. And so if you are willing and wanting and desiring to be covered by the blood of Christ, he desires to cover you and to forgive you and to empower you with the Holy Spirit to help you change.
[00:36:25] And so village church, I can't think of a better gift from God than salvation, forgiveness and freedom. I want to close with Ezekiel 18:21.
[00:36:35] If a wicked person turns away from all his sins, he shall surely live.
[00:36:42] He shall not die. Let's pray together.
[00:36:46] Father, I want to just thank you for the ways that you anticipate, how we will struggle.
[00:36:53] You see fully and completely those secret sins that have and that will tempt us. Would you give us the courage to say no?
[00:37:02] Would you give us the strength to say yes, to say yes to blessing, to say yes to peace, to say yes to integrity?
[00:37:10] You also see fully and completely our current dark secrets. Thank you just for always holding out hope and forgiveness and second chances.
[00:37:19] Thank you for addressing these things honestly, just so bluntly, in your word. And you do all of this because you love us.
[00:37:26] For those who have never repented and trusted in Jesus, may you by the power of your Holy Spirit, move them to that end. Because the fruit of repentance and of coming to Jesus is nothing less than life and flourishing. And I can't think of a better gift for each one of us than that. Lord, I'm so grateful that we get to celebrate this baptism now. And we give you in all things, all glory and honor and power, and we do it all in Jesus name. Amen. Amen.
