 And today I want to share a message entitled Kingdom Politics. Now I want to share about what is the true kingdom perspective on this topic of politics because you know we see a lot of people they become either divisive, distracted, or they start idolizing politics. They get obsessed with it instead of the things of God and they just kind of drift away from what truly matters. And sometimes that division and that contention can really leave a sour taste in our mouth about politics, about Christians being engaged in politics or talking about politics. But politics is very important and it's very important to God all throughout the Bible. We see God's people in the political realm doing His will. Now although there might be division and people who don't operate the way God wants them to operate in this area, that doesn't mean we neglect it as a whole. And I want to offer a biblical sound perspective on how we are meant to engage, how the believer is meant to engage in politics. In Jeremiah 29-7, the Lord said this to Jeremiah. He said, Seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile and pray to the Lord on its behalf for in its welfare you will find your welfare. In Proverbs 29-2, when the righteous are in authority the people rejoice, but when a wicked man rules the people groan. And in Isaiah chapter 1 it says, Learn to do good, seek justice, rebuke the oppressor, defend the fatherless, plead for the widows. Rebuke the oppressor. Now I want to clarify some misconceptions because a lot of people unconsciously we believe certain things and we don't fully know kind of what the Bible says and as I mentioned we see all the division, the craziness, and we just want to be in the house of the Lord. We just want to be, you know, focused on the things of God. But I want to clarify some misconceptions that might be leading us away from having a true view, from being effective in this world, from being effective for the Lord in this very important realm which is politics. The first misconception is this, quote-unquote, politics isn't what's important, preaching the gospel is what's important. Now that's 100% true. Preaching the gospel is the most important thing possible. But if you look at the country of North Korea, and there should be an image behind me of the Korean peninsula, and you can see at night down below that's South Korea, up above is North Korea. Now after World War II the countries that split had very different trajectories and very different ways of living now. North Korea became extremely developed, went from poverty to prosperity, and there is freedom there, there is democracy there, and then North Korea is almost slavery for many people. And to preach the gospel there, try and go preach the gospel in North Korea. Try and get on a plane and go preach the gospel in North Korea, you can't. And to even be reading the Bible, to be caught with the Bible, to be singing a Christian hymn, to telling a friend about Jesus, you can face 15 years in prison sent to a labor camp along with your family. Because Satan has infiltrated the politics of that nation, God's word is unable to flow into that area to reach the souls there. So preaching the gospel is inevitably political. And the Lord wants the political structure of a place to be conducive for the gospel to be preached, while Satan wants it to be obstructive. He wants to create walls, prevent people from actually getting God's word for the salvation of souls in that area. And the early Christians knew this, that the preaching of the gospel is inevitably political, because Jesus told them. Jesus said in Matthew chapter 10, he says, Look, I'm sending you out as sheep among wolves, so be as shrewd as snakes and harmless as doves, but beware, for you will be handed over to the courts and will be flogged with whips in the synagogues. You'll stand trial before governors and kings because you are my followers. But this will be your opportunity to tell the rulers and other unbelievers about me. He specifically prepared his disciples for political engagement. From preaching the word, not from being obsessed about politics, from preaching the word, from preaching their testimony, who Jesus Christ is, it's inevitably political. An angel of the Lord even told Paul, he says, You're going to stand before the emperor of Rome, Caesar. The emperor of Rome, the most powerful human being on the entire earth at that time, Caesar. Paul was going to stand before him for preaching the gospel. The persecution in ancient Rome was so bad that to even be going to life group on Tuesday night, you were in risk of treason and being executed. Just imagine that. You want to go to life group, gather with a bunch of believers, go through the words, study the scriptures. You were at risk of being the FBI coming into your door, knocking you down, stripping you away from your kids and executing you. That's what it was like in ancient Rome. The early Christians had to find ways to spread the gospel in such a demonic and dark and, and obstructive culture. One of these ways was the fish symbol. You ever seen the fish symbol on the bumper, bumper stickers and stuff? Well, you know, wonder why that is associated with Christianity. Well, that was actually one of the early Christian symbols used amidst that persecution. Fish in Greek is ichtis. And it's an abbreviation for an encoded message of the gospel. And behind me, you'll see this fish right here with ichtis below. It's actually I, Iota, Kai, Theta, Upsilon and Sigma. Those are the letters. And this is what's encoded. Iota is Jesus, which is Jesus. Kai is Christos, which is Christ or anointed one. Theta is Theu, which means God. Upsilon is Uyos, which means Son. And Sigma, the last letter is Soter, means Soter, which is Savior. Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior. This is the symbol they used to go undercover, to, to operate under the scenes and preach the word and spread the word of God. And in only a few hundred years, the biggest empire on Earth was converted to Christianity. They overtook the biggest empire on Earth because they were engaging. They were strategizing. They were seeing how can we spread the word in this political persecution? How can we spread the word as Jesus commanded us to? Inevitably, they're going to engage with the governors, the kings, the rulers, the emperors, and they're going to need the Holy Spirit's guidance on how to penetrate and effectively bring God's will here on Earth. We see in modern times, and actually the spirit of this house has a great deal of ancestral connection to Soviet Union communism. And the senior pastor of our house, Pastor Vasili, his grandfather, was actually a, he was martyred for the cause of Christ in the Soviet Union. And he would not renounce his faith. They put him in prison. He would end up getting dragged behind a horse and suffered traumatic brain injuries and died because his faith was so strong in Jesus Christ. He wasn't going to relinquish his faith for some communist government. He wasn't going to relinquish fear not who can kill the body, but he can cast a soul into hell. And there is a fight that the Christian needs to have to hold strong to the faith because our rock on which we stand is Jesus Christ who is eternal. And we will continue in this church fighting against any persecution that comes against the spreading of the gospel, whether it's a planned pestilence that tries to shut down all the churches and force people to take things against their will and scientific scrutiny, whatever it might be, God's people will fight for the kingdom of God and the salvation of souls on this earth. Jesus said, go into all the world and preach the gospel. All the world is every single government, nation, political structure, whatever it might be. And the second misconception is this. We're citizens of heaven, not of earth. Politics are earthly and temporary. And the things of heaven are really all that matter. We are citizens of heaven in Philippians 3.20, but we are citizens of heaven where the Lord Jesus Christ lives. And we're eagerly waiting for him to return as our savior. And we're also seated with Christ in heavenly places. But the reality is we can be dual citizens. We can be citizens of heaven and citizens of a nation here on earth. Paul actually used his citizenship to get out of government torture and imprisonment. We see Acts chapter 22, they tied Paul. He was literally preaching his testimony, preaching the word of God. The Jews wanted to kill him, wanted him to get executed, so he gets imprisoned. And he says this, when they tied Paul down to lash him, Paul said to the officers standing there, is it legal for you to whip a Roman citizen who's never been tried? When the officer heard this, he went to the commander and asked, what are you doing? The man's a Roman citizen. So the commander went over and asked Paul, tell me, are you a Roman citizen? Yes, I certainly am, Paul replied. I am too, the commander muttered. And it costed me plenty, Paul answered, but I'm a citizen by birth. The soldiers who are about to interrogate Paul quickly withdrew when they heard he was a Roman citizen and the commander was frightened because he had ordered him bound and whipped. We too can have a valuable earthly citizenship. And just as Paul used his to get out of that persecution, we can use ours. And even to be a United States citizen is an immense privilege here on this earth. The Constitution of the United States is one of the most unique documents on the planet earth because of the rights that it bestows upon its people. Thomas Jefferson, a founding father, he wrote this, these famous words. We hold these truths to be self evident, the truths of the rights of every human being, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain inalienable rights. Among those are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. And with a firm reliance on the protection of divine providence, we mutually pledge our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor. When he wrote this and the people who signed it, they knew that if they lost the war against the greatest military on the planet at that time, Great Britain, that they would be executed, that they would lose their entire fortune and it would not pass on to their children. They signed away everything and they believed that these truths were self evident from our creator. And the Bible even says there's neither Greek nor Jew, neither slave nor free, male or female, we're all one in Christ Jesus. These are biblical values, Judeo-Christian values that built the West. Thomas Jefferson also said, God who gave us life gave us liberty. And can the liberties of a nation be secure when we've removed a conviction that these liberties are a gift of God? Our liberties rely on a belief in God. And what's happening in the world today? People are coming against that very notion that there is a God who created all things, who is holy, righteous, and just. And if you don't believe there's a God, how can you believe there's an absolute morality? If you think evolution is the truth and hey, the strongest wins, you have the right, like Machiavelli said, to oppress the weak because genetically you're stronger and the gene pool needs to increase. And then all these dark ideologies like eugenics and the holocaust are trying to cleanse the genetics to create a master race. It becomes more feasible because you don't see the inherent value of a human soul and the inherent absolute morality that we are meant to live by that God has put in his word. And that's why Satan wants to destroy the United States, rip away those rights. But just like Paul, we need to use those rights to spread the gospel. And when you hear about separation of church and state, people try and use this all the time. Well, you shouldn't be trying to influence, you know, the government and politics with your religion. There's a separation of church and state. The Constitution says, well, actually, the Constitution never says that. And it was in a letter that Thomas Jefferson wrote to a Baptist church in 1802 where he mentions this idea. And what this idea is, is that the state cannot dictate or demand a specific denomination that everyone has to pledge allegiance to. Because prior, it was the Catholic church that you must describe to every doctrine. Then it was the Anglican church and the king. You must subscribe to every doctrine. So then these pilgrims come on the Mayflower to the United States and they want to practice their faith as they believe the scripture and God wants them to. And this, this idea was that this country is going to be a place where you can truly interpret the word of God as you wish and worship God in your way. And that the state with its political power, with its military power, cannot tell you what to do in that area. It's not that we can't influence government. We're meant to influence government to make this place because our welfare relies on the welfare of the country we're in. Another aspect of this misconception that must be clarified is that although, you know, we are not of this world, we can still be in this world. You know, we don't need to, to completely place our identity 100% there and forget about the identity that God has given us here. And Jesus actually prayed to the Father. He said, I've given them your word and the world has hated them because they're not of the world. Just as I am not of the world, I do not pray that you should take them out of the world, but that you should keep them from the evil one. So when you're saved, when you're born again, when you have faith in Jesus Christ, you've been cleansed of your sin, you have an eternal dwelling place that will, you will dwell in, in heaven. And you have a security that you are sealed for the day of redemption by the Holy Spirit, but God still has a plan for you in this world. Although you've been translated from the kingdom of darkness to the kingdom of light, you still have a purpose in this world. And what Christians are meant to do is make this world more like heaven in the Lord's prayer. The only time that Lord Jesus Christ actually gave a specific words on how to pray when his disciples were asking him, he said, you will be done. Your kingdom come. You will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Christians are meant to bring the will of God, the very values, the very culture, the very state of heaven where there is no suffering, no pain, no tears, where we are meant to bring that will into this earth of righteousness and holiness, bring healing to people who are in darkness, be the be the ambassadors of Christ that we are, that the Bible says and ambassadors of political office term. We're meant to represent our citizenship in heaven here in this fallen world where we are dwelling here temporarily. And we're meant to be ambassadors for the will of Jesus Christ, for the will of heaven, just as an ambassador of this nation and another nation is meant to, you know, speak on behalf of that nation to do the will of that nation in the foreign nation. We are meant to do that here on earth because we are citizens of heaven, ambassadors of Christ, and we are called to make this world more like heaven. This doesn't mean that we usher in the totality of God's kingdom here on earth. That's going to come after his second coming when the new Jerusalem comes, when we all dwell in the kingdom of God forever. But that doesn't mean that we're not meant to be doing things here on earth. Instead, we're meant to be zealous for good works. The Bible constantly says, be zealous for good works. Jesus told us to be salt and light in this world. Assault preserves what is good and also makes things better. In the light, it brings life to earth, the light of the sun. And it also exposes the works of darkness. Jesus said, let your light shine so before men that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven. Ephesians 511 have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. When you are a Christian, when you have the light that's in you, you will automatically expose the works of darkness. You will automatically expose where the enemy is operating, which is in deception, which is in lies, which is in fake news, trying to deceive people from actually knowing the truth. But we have the Spirit of truth, the Holy Spirit, who leads us into all truth. We are the ones who are meant to be the beacon of light on the hill. We are the ones who are meant to bring light to this world that we live in, this dark and fallen world. We have a relationship, a connection to the very source of light. Jesus is the light. God is light. What we do in this lifetime is also extremely important because it actually determines our rewards in heaven. So we're not meant to just passively wait around for Christ coming after we're saved. We're meant to be activated by the Holy Spirit, empowered by the Holy Spirit to do the works of God. And we're actually in a war, like Paul told Timothy, to be a soldier in Christ. We're meant to be enlisted into the war. Well, what is the war? 1 Corinthians 5.58. Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your labor is not in vain. Always abounding in the work of the Lord, not just passively waiting, always abounding, and that everything you do for the Lord is not in vain. It's noticed. God sees it. There is a reward. 2 Corinthians 5.10. For we almost appear before the judgment seat of Christ that each one may receive the things done in the body according to what he has done, whether good or bad. Everything's weighed, everything's seen, everything's worth it. Paul told Timothy, command those who are rich in this present age not to be haughty nor to trust in uncertain riches, but in the living God who gives us richly all things to enjoy. Let them do good that they be mere rich in good works, ready to give, willing to share, storing up for themselves a good foundation for the time to come. We're meant to be rich in good works, and the Spirit of God empowers us. He is the fuel that we are empowered, because it's not I who live, but Christ who lives in me, and he has a will that he wants to happen on this earth, in this nation, in this world. He wants to reach, whether it be your school, whether it be your city, maybe the school system, where Satan is trying to infiltrate. His will wants to travel through you when you submit to him and actually impact and influence the world around you. And Titus, it says, our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us that he might redeem us from every lawless deed and purify himself for his own special people, zealous for good works, zealous, hungry, determined for good works. Ephesians 2-10, where his workmanship created in Christ Jesus for good works. This church, coming to church on Sunday, isn't a destination. It isn't the, hey, I'm a great Christian Lord, now I'm good now, I'm coming to church, I'm bringing my family. This is the gas station. You get fueled up here listening to these messages to go out into your world that God has you and to reach people for the kingdom of God. This is where you get armed and equipped, the armory where you get strengthened as a good soldier in Jesus Christ, and you go out into the world and you fight for the things of God. This isn't the destination, it's the gas station. The fourth misconception is that Jesus wasn't involved in politics nor were his disciples. You know, they're just focused on the spiritual things of the kingdom of God. Well, the reality is Jesus was crucified by the political leaders and so were many of his disciples. He was actually sent to trial before the Sanhedrin, which was a 71 member council in that time that was full of Sadducees, the Pharisees and other leaders, and they gave the judgments, criminal, civil judgments on people up into the death penalty they had the power. But since they were under the power of Rome, the control of Rome, they couldn't issue the death penalty, hence why they had to go to Pontius Pilate to kill Jesus. The Herodians, you might think, well, King Herod, isn't he the political? They were more so in charge of enforcing the collection of taxes, administrative things, and they left the Sanhedrin to judge the actual enforcement of the Torah, the law of society. So Jesus was constantly at war with the Pharisees. He called them the brood of vipers, sons of the devil. You're of your father, the devil, you hypocrites. He was constantly at war. They were trying to trap him countless times to try and kill him. Literally, these were the people who were trying to kill Jesus since the dawn of his ministry. And even before that, King Herod was trying to kill him when he was a baby. Jesus was at war with the political leaders of his day because they were not on the side of God. And when we look at men and women of God throughout history in the Bible, we see the same theme. John the Baptist, who Jesus said was the greatest of all men, was beheaded for exposing the evil deeds of Herod and Herodias. And you might say, man, he was beheaded. That's kind of a tragic death. Well, beheading in the New Testaments associated with the honor of martyrdom. And those who will be beheaded during the Great Tribulation are the ones who will reign with Christ for 1,000 years, it says in Revelation chapter 20. So you're saying that the greatest man to ever live somehow wasn't meant to make that decision to expose the sin of the political leaders? The Bible would likely say otherwise. In Esther, she risked her own life to influence the king and actually the legislation to prevent a genocide. And she said that if I perish, I perish. She fasted to make the decision to approach the king because if you approach the king without being summoned, you risked death. And she knew I need to do this. I need to influence, I need to protect my people. She was engaged in politics and it was actually Mordecai was the one who uncovered Haman's plans to exterminate the Jews. After this whole fiasco, he gets promoted to second in command of the Persian Empire, a man of God. Daniel, highly influential in government, even in a wicked nation. So you might think, man, all the politicians are corrupt, the nation's corrupt, everybody's corrupt, there's no way there can be somebody who's truly serving God there. Well, Daniel was in Babylon, an extremely wicked nation, but he was a very powerful leader in that nation for the force of good. He was communing with the Lord every single day, even when there was an edict saying, you can't pray. He prayed to the Lord and it got a sentence to a lion's den, but God supernaturally protected him. The Bible says he had a spirit of excellence on him and that his enemies could find no fault in him, no corruption, no crony capitalism, no little deals and bribes. There was no fault found in him, yet he was serving as a politician in an extremely wicked nation under three different kings. Nathan the prophet boldly confronted King David over his sin, a sin that David thought nobody knew about. David could have killed the guy right there and kept living on, nobody knew about his sin. Nathan knew that risk, but he boldly confronted him because the Lord said so. Prophet Samuel rebuked King Saul when he disobeyed God's command. Jeremiah advised the king to surrender to the Babylonians because the city of Jerusalem would be destroyed. He ends up not surrendering and Jerusalem gets destroyed. Joseph was second in command of Egypt, a very wicked pagan nation, and governed with absolute wisdom. In one man in history who we actually don't learn much about in mainstream schools, surprisingly, is a man named William Wilberforce. And William Wilberforce, back in the late 1700s, was instrumental in abolishing the slave trade in Great Britain. And this occurred before the slaves were actually freed here in America. It first happened in Great Britain and the people behind it were godly men, godly men and women. They were fueled by God, by the scriptures to see that African slave on the boat being crammed where they can't even lie down. They're stacked on top of each other, not as some cattle, but as a human soul made in the image of God with equal worth and value to them. But the politics of that time did not believe that. Actually, the economy was booming. The slave trade was bringing great prosperity. People didn't want to touch on that. Hey, you little conspiracy theorist, no way they're getting transported like that in the ships. No, they're treated okay, we have a great economy. Why are you bringing this up? Well, William Wilberforce wasn't actually a believer for the first 20-something years of his life. He was a very wealthy man born in an upper-class family and he ends up going to Cabrange University and he befriends a guy named William Witt the Younger. Now, after they graduate, William Witt the Younger goes into politics and Wilberforce decides to follow in and back in that day, you could pretty much buy your votes. So they both go in. William Witt, his friend, becomes Prime Minister at the age of 24. Like a very incredible political feat and now he's like, wow, one of my best friend is Prime Minister, I have a great career ahead of me. This is incredible, they're going to gentlemen's clubs, they're revered in the town, they're doing all sorts of going to parties and drinking and they're just living the high life as these very, very renowned people in that time. Then his mom invites him to go on a European vacation. They're going to take a carriage across Europe and he can bring a friend. His family's not really Christian, not really religious. So he wants to bring a friend, the friend can't, so he brings a guy named Isaac Milner. This guy's a mathematician and a theologian, really instrumental in bringing the faith into Cambridge actually at that time. And so they get in the carriage ride together and it starts to come up like, hey man, yeah, I'm a Christian. And Wilberforce said something effective like, really man? Like, you know, he kind of disses his faith and Isaac Milner's like, dude, if you actually want to have this conversation, let's have it, but let's not have those little comments because I could totally just basically lay out the whole thing to you here. If you want to have a conversation about this, let's do it. And Wilberforce says, all right, let's do it. And over those course of the week, he's studying the scriptures, hearing the reasons for why the Bible is true, why Jesus Christ is Lord and Savior, why this faith is actually the truth, he gets converted right there. He goes back home and he's like, what do I do? You know, my best friend, what's he gonna think of me now that I'm this kind of like Methodist, kind of religious Bible flumper fanatic, like no one like this in politics is really doing this much, like what do I do? And he's very confused, but his friend, William Witt, was actually very supportive of him. And he thought, Wilberforce thought, man, I can't be in politics, this is so corrupt, this is so crony, this is so just a dirty place, I need to be in ministry, God's calling me to ministry. So he was really wondering like, you know, I've been so touched by the Lord, I guess the automatic answer is I have to go to ministry to kind of prove my devotion. So he ends up meeting a guy named John Newton. This is the man who wrote the beautiful Christian hymn, Amazing Grace. He was a former slave trade captain. So he was shipping slaves on the boat until he got converted and it became an Anglican priest and a huge staunch abolitionist. So he goes and meets John Newton and John Newton says, you know, gives him the advice that you don't need to leave politics, God's placed you there, God has a purpose for you there, God has desires there, God has desires to free the slaves there, to change this nation, to reform culture, the morality of our very nation. You don't need to just join the ministry to somehow be more spiritual. And when we look at the Bible, not every single person was a Levite priest in the ministry of the spiritual things. They were political leaders. They were in the industry, they were in business. And this revolutionizes Will before his mind at the time, he's like, oh my gosh, okay, I'm gonna stay in politics and I'm gonna end the slave trade and change this country to have morals that align with the word of God. And over the course of decades of a hard fight, he does so. And that is a clear testament to us in this time that if you are placed in a certain area and you love the Lord, you're devoted to him, but you feel like you have to go into ministry, that's not the case. God wants to do something through your life where he has you. And that could be in any area. We preach the gospel in all the world, in every area, in every industry, and politics is a huge means by which God can accomplish his will. And now today, America followed suit, the slaves are freed, there is still slavery in this world today, but it's the very principles and values of the kingdom of heaven that were translated here on earth by the obedient servants of God that brought this unrighteousness to death and brought justice in this world. The last misconception is that Christians must obey every form of government. Now the main scripture behind this is Romans 13, and it says this, let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. Consequently, whoever rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves. For rulers hold no terror for those who do right, but for those who do wrong. Do you wanna be free from fear from the one and authority? Then do what is right and you will be commended. For the one and authority is God's servant for your good. But if you do wrong, be afraid, for rulers do not bear the sword for no reason. They are God's servants, agents of wrath to bring punishment on the wrongdoer. So some people interpret this scripture and many Christians get confused by this scripture because they're like, let everyone be subject to the governing authorities, there's no authority except that which God has established. There's no authority. So even Stalin, Pol Pot, Hitler, like meant to submit to them, well, clearly not. And when we actually read the second half of that passage, it says the one and authority is God's servant for good. So if the definition of that word authority there is later clarified, that that authority is the God's servant for good. It can't be God's servant and genociding people. It can't be God's servant and going against the very morals and the virtues of God. God's servant is aligned with God's will. And that is clearly clarified in the second half of this passage. But a lot of people preach this out of context, including the Third Reich in Nazi Germany. The Third Reich loved to preach this verse as somehow submission to the Third Reich Nazi regime was a divine command from God. And the church got deceived like you would not believe. But there were people fighting it. And one of these men was Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Dietrich Bonhoeffer grew up in Berlin, ended up wanting to become a theologian. None of his family was in the ministry, but he felt called and his family was like, are you sure, you know, it's not the highest paying job, you know, you want to do this? He's like, yes, I'm feeling called. And he ends up teaching at Berlin University. I think he gets his PhD, like two of them maybe, at age of 21. Ends up teaching at Berlin University and he actually taught something that was revolutionary at that time. Because the theology that was taught was very Lutheran. German, you know, Martin Luther was a German. Lutherism was very, very strong there. But his idea was that when you're reading the scriptures, you're not just studying information. You're actually communing and conversing with God. You're having an active conversation with the Lord when you read his word. And his students that testify of how he taught said this was mind blowing at the time. It wasn't taught in the seminary that he taught in. And he ended up, started to ruffle some feathers with the Nazis. In the 30s, he started preaching sermons. He saw, from the very beginning, Dietrich Bonhoeffer saw that the Nazis, they were bad. A lot of people got deceived in the beginning. They thought, hey, Hitler could revolutionize our economy. We've been, you know, our nation has been just kind of destroyed since World War I and the Treaty of Versailles and all these things. But Dietrich Bonhoeffer knew that there was a sinister force behind the Nazi Third Reich. And he started preaching sermons that were emphasizing, one time on the radio, he preached that Jesus Christ's savior, no one else. And it was a clear attestation coming against with the Führer complex that he believed people were having. That Hitler was now like the savior, was now like taking the place of Jesus Christ. He's preaching this message and the radio broadcast gets cut off halfway through. And we don't fully know why, but very odd circumstance. Then he ends up getting prohibited from preaching sermons, prohibited from publishing books. And the Nazis are really on him. So he starts an illegal seminary that gets shut down. He's trying to raise disciples of Christ who are truly aligned with the word. Then he's a part of a movement where the church of Germany actually splits. And his movement, which was the minority, was the confessing church. The other was the German national church, basically. And the German national church was basically under the Nazi power, Romans 13, all this stuff, just kind of obey. And they ended up instituting this very historic moment. There was something called the Aryan paragraph that every church needed to put in their basically by-laws. And what it was is that no one from Jewish ancestry can hold a position of power in your church. And this was a huge dividing line. And a lot of pastors, hey, just go through with it. It's fine, it'll be okay just for this moment. Like we don't want to upset. It's this slow progression that the enemy has. Like he did in communism in the Soviet Union. And in the Third Reich, it's this slow progression of these slow ways where the church, Satan just puts the noose around the church's neck. And pastors just start, oh, bang, they don't want to get sent to prison. They don't want to lose their, because if you could actually be disbanded from your role by the SS, and you would lose your provision. You'd lose your provision for your home. Finances, like there was a lot at stake to speak out. But Dietrich did. And ends up, World War II comes along 1940 and he's about to be enlisted into the war. But a friend of his in the US who has all these connections at a seminary in New York, one of the most famous, he pulls all these strings so he can teach at the seminary and be away from Germany during the war so he wouldn't be sent and captured and arrested. So he goes to the US in one month in his journals. He's saying, Lord, what do you want me to do? I don't feel this is right. What do you want me to do? He knows he has to go back. He goes back to Germany at the start of the war. After being banned, after being a political enemy, he goes back and says, my people need me. This nation needs me. He goes back into the height of World War II in Nazi Germany. And his brother-in-law happens to be part of the German intelligence division, gathering intelligence, but he's a part of a plot to overthrow Hitler. So instead of getting enlisted into the military, Dietrich Bonhoeffer works for his brother-in-law in German intelligence, travels to the Allied nation, supposedly gaining intelligence for Nazi Germany, but he's really engaged in a plot to overthrow and assassinate Hitler. He's letting Jews escape to Switzerland. He's a part of all these operations undercover. The whole, his whole family was writing encoded letters to each other. They knew what was happening in the concentration camps because they were part of German intelligence. A lot of that was covered up. A lot of the murder and the execution and the genocide was being covered up. They knew what was going on. And this is called Operation Valkyrie that he was intimately connected with. And it gets to this point where he gets arrested for seven Jews crossing the border to Switzerland. He gets thrown in a prison interrogated. He thinks he's gonna get out, I'm just, my name came up, it's about this. It's not about Operation Valkyrie. But then they're trying to kill Hitler. And in this moment, there's a bomb that's literally feet away from Hitler. And there's this table with one of those big legs. It's this big conference table where they're having a military meeting. And there's this huge leg and the bomb is set right there. So this big piece of wood is here and Hitler's right here. And in this moment, the bomb is set, the man leaves, the bomb explodes. People in there die. Hitler has a few bumps and scratches. Survives the assassination. In the following days and weeks, 6,000 people are rounded up. Dietrich Bonhoeffer's rounded up. The beserked Hitler tries to just execute this from his leadership because literally high-up military general is trying to assassinate him. And Dietrich gets sent to a concentration camp in just a few days before the liberation of that camp he was executing. And he doesn't live on. But he's one of the greatest theologians. And one of his books called The Cost of Discipleship is actually renowned, taught in seminaries worldwide about true discipleship. What it means to be a disciple of Jesus Christ. To actually submit, to deny yourself, to die to yourself, and to live for Jesus. He is a living testament of what it means to truly serve God in the area he has you in. Because sometimes it can be dark and dirty like that living in the Third Reich. Two of his quotes are this, silence in the face of evil is evil itself. God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act. We're not to simply bandage the wounds of victims beneath the wheels of injustice. We're to drive a spoke into the wheel itself. In Proverbs 31, it says speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves. For the rights of all who are destitute speak up and judge fairly, defend the rights of the poor and needy. The reality is Christians are meant to obey godly governments and not submit to demonic wicked ones. Ones that are in alignment with his word and his righteousness. That is the true interpretation of the word of God and that scripture. We see this all throughout the Bible. Peter and the apostles, they were literally imprisoned and they said to the people in prison, then we ought to obey God, not man. When they said, you can't be preaching in the name of Jesus. They'd be, we're gonna obey God, not man. And Peter was actually literally freed from prison from an angel of the Lord. So if the, you know, his edict was be sent to prison, the government said be sent to prison. The Lord sent an angel and broke him out of the prison that the government wanted him to be in. Rahab illegally hid the two spies, misled the king, God granted her mercy and reward for that act. Moses led a whole uprising against the nation of Egypt came against defying the Pharaoh's orders and then built an entire new government and political system straight from God. Elijah confronted, contested King Ahab, Queen Jezebel at the risk of his own life. Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego refused to obey the king and bow to an idol. They were thrown into a fiery furnace. They survived. The Lord divinely protected them. The wise men actually that came to Jesus, they disobeyed Herod when he said, come back to me after you found him. Let me know. They were divinely instructed in a dream to not go back to Herod. Constantly throughout history, people disobeying authority that is demonic, that is evil, that is unrighteous, that is unjust, that is not in alignment with God's word. But there are things that we always gotta remember as well because people do get distracted. People do get divisive. People do idolize politics and they need to have their rock, which is on Christ, their firm foundation and the word. One of the things we need to remember is that our identity in Christ supersedes our national identity. Our heavenly citizenship is more important than our earthly one. Abiding in the word is more important than abiding in the news. Our spiritual family is more important than our political party. We're children of God. We're brothers and sisters. Although some might be pretty deceived, you might think a little bit cuckoo for believing certain things. They're children of God. They're in our family. We're meant to love them. Ephesians chapter two, it says, for through him we both have access by one spirit to the Father. Now therefore you're no longer strangers and foreigners but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God. We are his family. We are in his household. Whatever political party you might be, the believer in Christ who has the Holy Spirit is a son and daughter of God, our Father. John 13, Jesus said, a new commandment I give to you that you love one another as I have loved you. That you love one another. By this all will know that you are my disciples. If you have love for one another, not hatred and division and attacking one another but have love for unity. And first John, and it's actually a way in which people will know that we are his disciples, that God is real. That what is this supernatural love? Usually this would divide people but somehow there's a connection there. What is that? That's how they will know that you are my disciples. We're meant to love one another. First John four, if someone says I love God but it hates a fellow believer, that person's a liar. For if you don't love people, we can see how can we love God whom we cannot see? And if he's given us this command, those who love God must also love their fellow believers. Next thing we gotta remember is no matter what happens in the world, nothing can take us away from Jesus. Only ourselves. Fear not who can kill the body but he who can cast a soul into hell. To die is gain, to live is Christ. Nobody can snatch us out of his hand. It is our own free will to forfeit the gift that he's given us. But no force can take us away from our union with Christ. Lastly, no president, no government, no human leader can save us, only Jesus can. For God still loved the world, that he gave his only begotten son that whosoever believeth in him shall not perish but have everlasting life. And there is no other name under heaven by which mankind must be saved. There is salvation found in no other name, but through Jesus. He said, I am the way, the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but by me. Jesus is the one. No leader, no president, no administration's gonna save us. The only thing, the only person that will is Jesus Christ and he's alive today. He still moves today. As you saw in the testimony here and the countless testimonies throughout our church of God moving, we wanna show God is actually alive. He's not just as words on a page, this Bible written 2,000 years ago. He is alive, he is active, and he is the way. Thanks for watching this sermon. If this was a blessing to you, would you let me know in the comments below what stood out to you from this message? What are you taking home with you from this message? 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