 Good afternoon. Good morning. Hope you all are doing well. This will not be a very long Bible study. However, I think it'll be a very beneficial Bible study. I think that it is something that is going to, matter of fact, it applies to everybody. And it's kind of an unlikely character that we are going to use. We are going to cover. We are going to cover a man by the name of Ahab. Now, on tomorrow we are going to, that is for those who are actually doing the homework assignments that we are doing through Patreon. We're going to cover that, as a matter of fact, in a way that you might not think. We're going to cover something. The answer is actually, I'll give kind of the key to the answer to the questions that we're given. This has to do with regeneration of the heart and so forth, how Old Testament Saints were born, how Old Testament Saints were saved. This deals with, and of course the homework assignment was deal with the people prior to the flood. So only a few chapters and genesis. And then after the flood, prior to the law, and then after the law, obviously prior to the cross. We understand after the cross. And so from the law, prior to the cross. Well, I'll give you a hint. A lot of the answer to the assignment is going to be found in or at least broached upon. And something that's been kind of trending, especially in Christian, let's say on Christian YouTube. Something of late that's been trending on Christian YouTube that will kind of give us a little bit of the answer. I won't give too much of it away, but we'll cover that tomorrow. Lord willing, if not, if something happens, the Lord comes. We all go to be with Him in glory. Well, then guess what? We don't need the Bible study. We don't need the homework assignment. So that is if anyone who has not taken part in it, you want to go to there and just kind of just test yourself and so forth, go to Patreon, just sign up, become a member is free. So you don't have to worry about paying anything is free. And you just get the different assignments. I was going to ramp up a little bit more. Oh, by the way, oh, by the way, we were actually on, I didn't realize this. I didn't realize this until until yesterday. Our seminary happens to be on spring break. So I'll get a little bit of extra, a little bit of extra time to kind of get things done. By the way, I've been bragging on you guys so much. I can't tell you how much I've been bragging on you, even in videos and even off videos. I really believe this. And I'm not, I'm not, I'm not being too boastful or bragging dose or anything like that or whatever, because it's not about me. But I really think that you guys, I would put you guys your understanding of the scriptures, your desire to grow in the scriptures. I will honestly, I would put it up against anybody else's group of the little family, YouTube family. I put it up against anybody else. I think that a lot of pastors that we talk about a lot of things that we see that are happening out there. I don't think so many people can hold a candle to you guys. I don't think so. I think too many people are worried about giving a presentation versus actually giving what the scriptures say. And so, and I mean that, I really do think that you guys are awesome. And so, especially the fact that you guys would even go ahead and take part in to the extra assignments on, on Patreon that just shows you are even awesome. So even when guys disagree, because we got folks that just, we got folks that are Pentecostal and charismatic in the chats. We've got folks that are Calvinist, those are dispensational, those that are not Calvinist and so forth. So yeah, I, we can get along and, and one of the things, here's how, here's how I know what kind of people you are. When I see brother Christopher in the chats and when someone comes in and they make a statement, it's almost like you can, you can set your watch to it. You can, you can bank on it. Chris is going to tell them, listen, we don't do that here in this chat. So if you're going to make a statement, you better give a scripture. And I just, it just does my heart so good. So anyway, by the way, hope you all doing well. Let's go ahead and jump into this. Now this is a lesson for us coming from an unlikely source. So we're going to read the entire chapter, first Kings 21. Now I thought that we would probably be on well into second Kings, but we're getting some stuff out of this. And so we're going to keep on going. What am I? Someone said, what am I? What am I? What do you think I am? You mean am I Calvinist? Am I Armenian? Am I provisionist? And neither. I am. I am neither. So I don't, I don't have a, a name, a title, a doctrinal creed that I, that I hold. As a matter of fact, you know what I'm going to do. I'm telling you what we're going to do. Everyone has a confession. There is a Westminster confession. There is a London, a 1689 London Baptist confession. Even other Baptist groups or Lutheran groups or Presbyterian, they might have their own confessions. Well, don't go on. We're going to have to have a smart Christians confession. We're going to have to put together a smart Christians confession of faith. Yeah. We'll figure that out real soon. And then that's, that's what I'll be. So anyway, let's go ahead and jump into it. First Kings, 21, one. Now it came about after these things that Naboth, the Jezreelite had a vineyard, which was in Jezreel beside the place of Ahab King of Samaria. Ahab spoke to the Naboth saying, give me your vineyard that I might have it for a vegetable garden because it is close besides my house. I don't feel like walking to the neighborhood whole foods. I want to have a vineyard right beside me. I want to plant some vegetables. I want to plant tomatoes and taters and corn and okra and all it. Yeah. This is my southern version of Ahab. Yes. That's what he wants to do. Now he's offering to buy, which is a good thing, but how he goes about it and actually get it. Yeah. Shame on you, Ahab. He says that I may have that I might have it for a vegetable garden because it is close beside my house and I will give you a better vineyard than it in its place. If you like, I will give you the price of it in money, but Naboth said to Ahab, the Lord forbid me that I should give to you the inheritance of my father. So Ahab came into his house, sullen and vexed because the word which Naboth, the Generalite, spoken to him. For he said, I will not give you the inheritance of my father's and he lay down on his bed and turned away his face and ate no food. So this big sissy. And let's just be honest. Let's just be honest. Ahab is a bit on the sissy side. Ahab is not the most manly man. He is not to be a king. You know what he is? He might be the softest king ever. He might be the softest king ever. And we know that because Bible talk about how Jezebel is kind of running things. And so you see this name which makes you wonder if this Jezebel that spoken of later on in the Bible. When you talk about the spirit of what you're really referring to is not an actual spirit or entity or demonic force called Jezebel but an attitude of an attitude like this, right? So you've got a spirit of weakness. Well, you just weak, just a weak spirit, right? Or you've got a soft spirit. You know, you just quiet and so forth. That's your attitude. Not necessarily there's an actual spirit that's over you. So anyway, that's how we see Ahab. But Jezebel, who is the opposite, shows up and his wife came to him and said to him. And I just kind of imagine that when he's in his... I imagine they probably take turns wearing the crown. Take turns sitting on the throne. All right, Ahab, it's time for you to get off. It's my turn to sit. Let me go ahead and do the ruling. So anyway, but Jezebel, his wife came to him and said to him, how is it that your spirit is so sullen that you are not eating food? So he said to her because I spoke to the neighbor of the Jezebelite and said to him, give me your venue for money or else. You know the story of verse seven. Jezebel, his wife said to him, do you now reign over Israel? Arise, eat bread and let your heart be joyful. I will give you the vineyard of Naboth the Jezebelite. Well, I got to give her credit though. Let's give Jezebel credit. She's fighting for her man. Now, it's her man, but she's kind of running him. But at least she's loyal, huh? So she wrote letter in Ahab's name and sealed him with his seal and sent letters to the elders and to the nobles who are living with Naboth in his city. Now she wrote the letter saying, proclaim him fast and seat Naboth at the head of the people. Naboth should have just known what was up. So there's gonna be a feast. And now all of a sudden you're gonna, Naboth, you should have had COVID that day. You should have said, I've got the flu. And so anyway, so she wrote these letters having Naboth sit to the front and seat two worthless men before him and let them testify against him saying, you cursed God and the king, then take him out and stone him to death. So here's the plan. Bring in Naboth and these two accusers are gonna come in and say, you cursed God and the king. Well, first of all, the irony. The irony of all of this to say that you cursed God, wait a second, no more than you have, you are at a front to God. As a matter of fact, we're going to see a description of Ahab in just a second. Let's continue verse 11. So the men of the city, the elders and the nobles who live in the city did as Jezebel had sent word to them just as is written in the letters which she has sent them. They proclaimed the fast and seated Naboth at the head of the table, I'm sorry, at the head of the people. Then the two worthless men came in. And by the way, I wonder who these guys are. Can you imagine you being cast as a two worthless men? And then at the end of the story, you have the rolling credits, worthless man, worthless man. Your name is there, which by the way, there have been times if the credits in our lives would have rolled, we would have been the worthless man, the worthless woman, the horrible person, the evil man, the evil. Let's just, let's be honest, at points in our times and our lives, we have played those parts. Then they, excuse me, so they took him outside after they said that, they took him outside the city and stoned him to death with stones. I love how the Bible does that sometimes. Stoned him with stones, as opposed to stoning him with paper. Stoned him with stones. Then they sent word to Jezebel saying, Naboth has been stoned and is dead. When Jezebel heard that Naboth had been stoned and was dead, Jezebel said, Ahab, arise, take possession of the vineyard of Naboth, the Jezebelite, which he refused to give you for money for Naboth is not alive, but dead. When Ahab heard that Naboth was dead, Ahab arose to go down to the vineyard of Naboth that Jezebelite to take possession of it. Okay, so now, there's need for me to read all of this because we're going to point out something. Then the word of the Lord came to Elijah the Tishbite, saying, arise, go down and meet Ahab, king of Israel, who was in Samaria. Behold, he is in the vineyard of Naboth where he has gone down to take possession of it. You should, so you're going to find him not necessarily at the scene of the crime, but kind of at the scene of the crime. He's actually indulging in his sin. You should speak to him in verse 19 saying, Thus says the Lord, have you murdered and also taken possession? Now, this isn't the first time that we've seen someone murder somebody and take possession of something that didn't belong to them. Can you guys think? Can you think of a time in the Scriptures that we've read thus far where someone has murdered someone and take possession of something that belonged to the murdered person? Just think about it. It shouldn't be too difficult. Exactly. Layman and Jeff both said David. David did the same thing. It's possible that you can be a person that God has chosen that phrase, a man after God's own heart does not mean that David had the same heart of God. That means that David was chosen by God. You all chose a man after your heart, which was Saul. Now God is going to choose a person who, by the way, is of the tribe of Judah. That doesn't mean that David had the heart of God. If that's the case, then we got a problem with God, because if that's the heart of God who would murder and steal and lie and commit adultery, that's not God. That's not what he meant. So we see that with David, so a person who God has decided to bless can still do some abominable things. You all ought to be able to say amen. Now, don't say it too loud because we don't want folks to know how bad you are or maybe are in work. God is still working on you. I get that. So don't say it too loud, but let's just tell the truth. Same devil, we can be rotten at times. We have been rotten at times. And if you don't believe so, go and ask one of your friends, one of your former friends. They'll tell the story. Anyway, continuing, you have murdered and also taken possession and you shall speak to him, saying, thus says the Lord, in the place where the dogs licked up the blood of Naboth, the dogs will lick up your blood, even your. So the same way that you're going to die, or the, how should I put it? The residue of your death was left from you. That'll be licked up by the dogs with the way that you dispose of this man. Same thing is going to happen to you. Ahab said to Elijah, have you found me? Oh, my enemy. Is that what I am now? I'm your enemy? Okay. And if I'm your enemy and I'm working on the same side as the Lord, what does that make the Lord? And he answered, I have found you because you have sold yourself to do evil in the sight of the Lord. Behold, I will bring evil upon you and will utterly sweep you away and cut off from Ahab every male, both bond and free in Israel. Everyone associated with you, gotta go. Your sons, even your servants and their sons. And I will make your house like the house of Jeroboam, the son of Neabody. Remember the story of Jeroboam? Gone. Everything. Everybody. And like the house of Basha, the son of Ahesia, because of your, because of the provocation with which you have provoked me that it's got to anger and because you have made Israel sin. That's it. Causing someone to sin or bringing sin in the house of Israel. We have a problem nowadays where people have been, even those that named the name of the Lord, whether they are or not, we have people who have brought sin into the church, made the church to be a place of sin or at least contribute to it. And maybe you didn't do as much as the next person, but you sure had a hand in it. You helped them enough. And maybe your sin was the sin that broke the camel's back, so to speak. Don't be the vessel that is responsible or part of the instruments that is used for bringing in sin amongst the believers, causing other folks of sin, having them to indulge in it, having their hearts to be kind of numb and callous to sin. They're sinning and you're sinning too. Hey, we're all sinning. You want some sin too? Here, open up a can of sin. Here you go. Don't be that Christian. Hey, ma'am. Of Jezebel, I'm sorry, verse 23, of Jezebel also has the Lord spoken. So not just you, but your little whacked out wife. Your crazy wife. She got to go too. She got to go too. She got to go too. There she went, she got to go to Jezebel, saying the dogs will eat jezebel in the district of Jezreel, not just eat your blood up, but eat her. The one belonging to Ahab, who dies in the city, the dogs will eat and the one who dies in the field. The birds of the heaven will eat. So there won't be any remnant of you or them, your people that they died in the city or the dogs get it. Once you're gone, you're gone. So surely, now by the way, let's put a pause on this. Remember where this is taking place at. All of this has happened after God has shown himself to Ahab. We know this because in the last session, we talked about how even Ahab goes and he told Jezebel all that God has done. And then Jezebel made a statement that Elijah, who at that point in time, if the credits would have rolled, would have said, and now playing the part of the profit chicken or the chicken profit, the scaredy cat profit Elijah, because at that point in time, he gets the word that Jezebel, she says, I'm gonna make sure that he's dead. I'm not phrasing exactly the way it was, but she's bound to kill him that day. Well, it's a few days later, it's a lot later. And Elijah, you're still alive. You're still alive. After all that you've done at the hand of God, only a few, and Elijah knows, there have not been very many men who the Lord has moved at their hand. We can count those men prior to Elijah on two fingers. Their names would be Moses. And then immediately after Moses died, then Joshua for a brief period. It's still called basically the ministry of Moses, but then Joshua did have a little hand in that. And so two people at the hands of the through God, that their hands would have some sort of miraculous things that would happen through there. Remember, there was another big water, a body of water crossing, Moses, part of the Red Sea, but then Joshua parted a river. So we know of two people, then here comes you Elijah, and you are letting this woman cause you to be afraid so much so that you go in hiding, that an angel has to come and tap you on the hill and wake you up, hey, get up, eat. I brought you here some food, hot bread, hot cakes, or whatever you call it, I guess hot cakes, hot bread, I don't know, might that have been pancakes? Don't know, but it was served fresh by an angel. How cool was that? Now I know you guys have probably had some wonderful Uber Eats drivers or DoorDash drivers or Instacart Delivers or whatever, none of them were angels, none of them were angels. And so here's Elijah getting this offer to him and he's afraid, but God, it's just me. It's just, I'm the only one, whoa is me and God, it's just me, God saying, shut up. All that wine, I've still got 7,000. So what are you talking about? The ministry is not depending upon you, Elijah, and haven't you not seen what I've been doing? Well, Ahab has. God has shown himself to Ahab a few times, as a matter of fact, even sending a prophet to speak to him. So he has seen the power of God. I'm going somewhere with this, ladies and gentlemen. He's seen the power of God, he has verbally spoken about the power of God. Yet and still, he has done things that were a severe affront to God. Let's continue. Verse 27, it came about when Ahab heard these words that he tore his clothes and put on sackcloth and fasted and he lay in sackcloth and went about despondently. That's a good word. Let's make that the word for the week, despondently. He went about despondently. This is, have you ever done something wrong? You just say it softly, say it softly. I know you have, but have you ever done anything wrong where while you've done it wrong, after you got in trouble, you didn't even want to talk loud. You were just kind of humbled in the way you moved about. You felt bad. If someone said something funny about somebody else, you didn't even want to laugh because you knew that was the wrong life of somebody else. You didn't even want to laugh at a real good joke because I shouldn't be laughing. If someone needed some money, someone who was homeless, that was luck. Hey, you're handing out money. Don't we do that. And so that's what he, he's behaving despondently. He's just real soft and treading lightly. So what'd you say? I can honestly say I've never used Door Dash or had my groceries. You are a wonderful person. Every time I do that, every time I do that, because it saves time, not on money, and they never, ever, ever give you what you want. They replace it the wrong way and then don't get vegetables or fruits because they're never fresh. And I'll say I won't do it again. And what do I do? Like the moron I am, I turn around and do it again. I'm through with Door Dash. I'm through, well not Door Dash. Usually with us, Uri, but I'm through with Instacart. Never again, never, never, never, never, never. And I still have this doggone app on this phone. If I was serious, I would just get rid of it, but I won't, I won't, I'm weak. When it comes to ordering food and stuff like that, I am the ahab of Door Dash and Uber Eats and all that. Yeah, I'm just, I'm weak. Y'all pray for me. Anyway, going back to this verse 28, then the word of the Lord came to Elijah, the Tishbite saying, and this is where we are. This is the whole point. Came to Elijah the Tishbite saying, do you see how Ahab has humbled himself before me? That right there, ladies and gentlemen, right there. That's it, that's it. Do you see how he has humbled himself before me? Because he has humbled himself before me, I will not bring the evil in his days, but I will bring evil upon his house and his son. There's going to be consequences. Do you know what a God has given Ahab an opportunity to do? To be fully repentant, to be fully repentant. That's what God is looking for. That's what I want. I don't want to talk, I want you broken. I want you broken. David says, the Lord wants a broken and contrite heart. Not a broken and contrite face. I don't care what your face looks like. I don't want a broken and contrite mouth, broken and contrite acts. I want a broken and contrite heart where you are literally broken on the inside. Go and read some of these songs that David puts out. And David is in despair. He's more than despondent. David is broken over a great many things. Over his house, the consequences of his house, well, you caused that because what you did, he's broken over that. What he did with Uriah and what he did with Bathsheba, broken over that. That's what I'm looking for. That's what I want. Here's the question. And I wanted to, I was gonna put it as a poll question, but not where they asked you straight to your face. Does God hear the prayers of the wicked? Is he gonna respond to wicked people praying? What's the likelihood of if a person who is truly wicked, if they pray that God will hear? Yeah. You better say yes, because that's you. That's you. Don't kid yourself in the thinking that he doesn't hear the prayers of the wicked. Otherwise, he would never hear yours. Now, are you considered in that category of wicked now? No. No. But, and I enjoy saying this part and I don't have any problem saying this part because it applies to me, but you're no good. You are no good. Let's just think of something disgusting. Let's think of pick up the, you know, one of those big old iron barrels that's got all kind of trash and junk and sludge and stuff in it. Well, just took that trash can over. That's you. The bottom of it. That's you. That's the sludge and juices. That's like your blood. That's you and me. No good. No, she said, Titi said, ooh, let me give you an example. Today, I have a four-year-old grandson who goes to use the bathroom. He likes to use the bathroom by himself. Well, good for us sometimes, but, you know, he's not the, he doesn't clean up by himself. He's a chill, I mean, I'm sorry. Well, you might want to put a, you might want to mute this part right here. When he used the bathroom, he didn't, one, he didn't have the, you know, he's four. So he's not, he's not Amy. He's not, you know, he's not a marksman. Y'all know what I'm talking about. And so I was in the bathroom today and there was a little bottle of bleach. And so what did I do? I just, I spilled, I saw something. I said, well, let me pick that up. I'm not sure what that is. And so I just poured some bleach around the bottom of the toilet. Well, when you pour bleach on the floor and there is urine there, it bubbles up, it fizzes up. Man, the whole bathroom floor around that toilet just fizzed up. All right, this little boy's been going to town. He is just, he has not been, like, what is he doing? What has this boy been doing? Now, is he welcome to use the bathroom? Sure. Do we know he's going to make a mess? Sure, some of you guys are saying you did too. Boys and girls. Yeah, if someone were to put a little light behind the bath by the toilet, whatever, yeah. Yeah. So, but when you see this bleach, you realize that even though you couldn't see it, no one could not see it. No one could see it because there's no stain there. But once you pour the bleach over it, there was sitting there or there was something there. Yeah, for instance, that wasn't all, yeah, it is. That was all him. That was all him. I usually don't go in that bathroom and then, well, I do from time to time, but no, this was him. If you, this was definitely him. Like, I won't get into the thickness of how I know it was him, but this was him. This was him. But he's four, so it's okay. But what's your excuse? Because you're not four. You're not 14. You might be 24, 34, 44, 54. What is your excuse? Because if we start pouring some sort of cleaning product around things, places where you go, we're going to see, we're going to see how bad. We're going to see your sin. Yeah, everybody can see it. Matter of fact, matter of fact, matter of fact, you don't even notice it that often. Have you, you can get so good at sinning and so casual that you even forget about the sin that you committed, that you committed. And you don't mean to, it's just, you know, you drop off, you shed sin. You shed sin like dogs shed hair. So he's four, but what about you? He's four, but what about you? And thank God that he does hear us even as bad and as rotten. And I'm talking about us as believers, but even the non-believers. He's not obligated to hear them. He's obligated himself to hear us. So you mess up and hear it. I want to cover something. By the way, I want to read this passage though we haven't gotten there yet. We haven't got, I'm going to jump ahead. I want to read the passage. We hadn't gotten there yet, but I want to make sure, I want to make sure that we add to this. He says, this is Ezekiel speaking in Ezekiel 3311. He says, say to them, as long as I, let me get this, as long as I live, declares the Lord God, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked. I don't want you to die. I don't want you to die, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. Ahab, we've been trying to get you straight. We're putting on this awesome demonstration with the Lord. Show all of those prophets that you had up, the prophets of Baal and Ashford, those 800 plus prophets, have them do their best. Call on their God, yell, screen cut themselves. And then let me go ahead and do a better demonstration. Let me go ahead and put water all over the trenches and so forth, all over the wood, and then watch God, but that didn't do enough for you. You've seen all that I've done, even send a prophet to you to speak to you and to bless you. Wasn't enough for you. So he says, I have no pleasure in the death of the wicked, but that the wicked turn from his way and live. Turn back, turn back from your evil ways for why will you die, O house of evil, why die? Unnecessary death. And that's really what it is. Well, that's the same with us. Now I wanna point out something that we talked about, but we don't really cover this a lot. Remember, God is under no obligation to any of us, me, you or anybody else. Rodney said, I was good at sinning. Yeah, you and me both. Matter of fact, all of us. We were at listen. We could all, all of us could write a best seller on how to sin and get away with it. Now, once we start writing it and giving our notes, we start comparing notes like, honey, me too, child, me too, girl, me too, man, me too. We all can write notes, I mean, write a book and they compare notes like, yeah, a lot of this stuff. A lot of this stuff is similar in my life. You look at some of these things that we see in the Bible, a lot of this stuff is similar, even for those that have the spirit of God in them. So it's not just them because guess what? You can do something that we say, you know, a person dying before their time. Obviously God has written that out. God has ordained, he has spread out the time, only he knows. But it's really an idiom to state, you know, someone died before their time. In other words, we're saying you die young because of something stupid that you did. You did something stupid and so you're dying because of that and you didn't need to. Now God knows and so forth and how that works together. We won't get into that, but still. You, you're playing, you're playing Russian roulette and then you die. Well, that wasn't a shock. You decided to go rob police headquarters because they've got money, they got cash, confiscated cash. And by the way, someone did that. Someone did that. I usually use it as a dumb thing to do. No one thinks to go and rob one of these places, one of these lockups. And someone I think about a month or two months, maybe three months ago, actually did that. Yeah, his funeral was a week after that. Yeah, they, he didn't make it out alive. I was stupid. How absolutely stupid. It's a, usually you won't find a greater, a larger collection of cash than from the monies that have been seized by police officers. And some guy thought, you know what? I hope he didn't, I hope he wasn't listening to me and say, oh, I didn't know that and decided to go rob him. I don't know. I don't know. If so, he wasn't listening good enough because I said that was stupid. That was absolutely dumb. And, and so because he died, no one was shocked. No one said, hey, wait, wait, wait a minute. Wait a minute. How can he die? How do you die like that? Or going fishing in a crocodile infested lagoon? Yeah, well, yeah. The fish ain't the only ones biting. So you can do some things that are just silly. It's like, wow, you died before it's time. I don't know. You died because you're stupid. You died because you were full of sin. You died because you were evil. You died because you were wicked. And so your death serves as a marker for other ones of people doing the same thing. But there's a passage. There is a passage that we need to look at. There's a passage that we've covered. We talked about it a little bit. We're going to talk about it some more. We're going to go back to Genesis. And what this shows, guys, what this highlights is the love of God. I said before, I remember talking about this before, that there are two. Matter of fact, let's see if you guys remember this. There are two overarching attributes of God. We said that God has what's called communicable attributes and in communicable attributes. You all remember that? Please tell me, you guys. I know this is session 34, 34 Bible studies. And so we said from the very beginning how God shows himself. Because what God is trying to show you more than anything else in the scriptures is him. If all you ever knew in the Bible was him and you, you've got enough to be saved. Because if you knew him and you really knew you and you were honest, you would be like the puppy who did something wrong, head down, tail between his legs, I need you. I messed up. Please forgive me. You would recognize you'd see how fallen you are when you compare the two. Again, I use the example of someone going on the football. I mean, basketball court. Have any of you guys ever played basketball with an actual NBA player? I did. Man, I had a couple of buddies that played in NBA as well. You played basketball with them and you feel like that's pretty good. And you play with them, you realize, not so much. We were shooting around with Reggie Miller. This is obviously something a long time ago. This was in the late 80s. Different. Just different. There's a guy named Vern Fleming who was a point guard for the Pacers. Just different. And Vern Fleming was not an all star by any stretch of the imagination in the NBA, but just different. So you recognize that different leagues. One of these things is not like the other. Well, when you come before God, even more so. When you come before, present yourself before a holy God, you realize, wow, I just, ugh. And you hear people in the Bible who mention about how they are, whoa, whoa unto me, I am undone. That's how we ought to be. That's why you play with Antoine Jameson's brother. Okay, 60 degrees of Kevin Bacon. Okay, I get that, I get that. But that's how it is when you're before the Lord. That's how it is. But you know what God did? Let me tell you what God did. Let me tell you what God went ahead and did. He is his two greatest, most overarching attributes. By the way, both of these attributes are communicable. Yes, both of them are. Now, what does communicable and incommunicable mean? Communicable attributes, communicable means an attribute that he communicates that he shares that we have in common. Incommunicable attributes are attributes that he has that we don't have. An example of his communicable attributes is that he's a loving God. Well, we love too. You got kids, grandkids, what we love. He has wrath, well, so do we. He's jealous, so are we now. Our jealous is not righteous jealousy though. So he's got things that he shares with us, okay? But he's also got attributes that he doesn't share with us, the incommunicable. The three that we always talk about is he's omniscient, omnipresent. Omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent. Well, we don't have that, none of us have that. None of us are omniscient, none of us are omnipotent. Although we think we're omnipotent, although we certainly think that we're omniscient, we're not omnipresent either, okay? Big one, he's sovereign, we ain't. What do we say above all else? God is sovereign, meaning you are not. The only thing that you've ever known or could ever know that sovereign is or only person that you can know is God, not your country, not you. But what are the two, we talked about this, I've been trying to get you guys time to figure this out. What are his two overarching attributes? Grayson, are you saying Grayson truth? Okay. Let's see, justice and mercy. Love, okay, there we go. Okay, not justice and mercy, but just or justice or righteous and love. So CG, Renard got it, I think someone else did too, some other folks did too as well. So those are the two overarching attributes that we see out of God. Now, what do you mean by that, Corey? Well, here's what I mean by that. God is a just God. God doesn't say something and not mean it. So his justice is the reason why folks go to hell is because he's just, he's a right judge. You are X, Y and Z, this is what you're getting because you're X, Y and Z. But then the other attribute that comes in that kind of helps us in dealing with that other attribute of his is his love. Justice dictates that there has got to be some sort of retribution for sin. Somebody gotta pay. Somebody's gotta pay. I like it, I'm a mess in, I like that. I'm a mess in progress, that is nice. It's true, we all are. Somebody's gotta pay. So what does love do? Love says, yeah, somebody's gotta pay, I'll pay. Anybody ever gone out with a bunch of other people? And man, this bill is too high. Who's paying? So God is paying. The bill is going to get paid, God is gonna pay. True story, and this happens probably, I don't know how many times it's probably happened, but I just remember one particular story where a group of folks go and pay. I mean, go to a restaurant. They go and at the restaurant, the bill is pretty high and no one on their own can pay for it. Nobody can pay for it. So there's a man who goes and sees it. This bill is, they did not count the cost. And so he goes and pays for all of their meal. Problem though, what's the problem? What problem could there possibly be for this man going and paying for this meal? For everybody's meal, the debt is paid. Well, there's one guy, let's just call him Willie because I know a Willie. I know a couple Willie, let's call him Willie. Willie decided to sneak out, took off and ran without paying. Hey, y'all, let me go to the bathroom. I'll be back, let me just go to the bathroom. Yeah, but they never saw Willie again. Well, they did see him again. Willie got picked by the cops and was taken down and booked for theft of service. He just happened to get caught before the bill was paid. Now the man was telling him that the bill was paid. So while he's out running, he's telling him I'll go ahead and pay the bill. And so he gets caught and booked and he's taken off. Now I don't know if the charges stuck, that'll be an issue between the lawyers, but Willie took off. Everyone else, they try to figure this out. And so here's a man that goes and pays for their bill. They're fine, they're grateful. Paid for all of them, including Willie's, but Willie is the one who gets in trouble. He's the one that's in handcuffs. He's the one that goes to jail. Again, I don't know the full story, what happened after that, if it was released or what have you. That's what God does. Somebody's paying his bill. Don't be like Willie. So in Genesis four, I wanna point out something that we see in Genesis four. Let's start off in verse three. So it came about in the course of time that Cain brought an offering to the Lord of the fruit of the ground. Now, why is that a big deal? Why is this a huge deal? This piggyback's off of something else that God did. Does anyone realize why this verse, along with another verse, just previous in the previous chapter, says something about God? Vitally important that you know this, because remember, we're looking at the character of God. We're looking at his attributes. We see something here in this passage here. Put it back on the screen. Genesis four, three. So it came about in the course of time that Cain brought an offering to the Lord of the fruit of the ground. So, why is that important? Why does that mean anything? That means a whole lot. Question, why are they even bringing an offering? What's the point of this offering? Who told them to bring an offering? Well, there's a right way and a wrong way to have this offering. And in this offering, Cain goes about it in the wrong way. It was not the fact that Cain brought fruit of the ground, whereas Abel brought animals, brought no, because they weren't told to do that. It wasn't that they were both told to bring animals. No, they were just supposed to bring an offering. Okay, now we'll deal with this issue as to whether someone has to, no Corey, the reason was he had to bring meat. No, we'll look at that in just a second. But that's it, Wayne. That's it, atonement. God has made a way, even after the fall, God has made a way to reconcile. When they sinned, what did God do? What was the first thing that God do after contraining them? What was the first thing God did? Well, God clothed them. You are ashamed. And so God closed them. I don't want you to be ashamed. I wanna have this relationship because what did God do? Now I want you to stop and think about what did God do? Now we didn't cover that. We'll make points of this as we go even further, but what did God really do? More than covering them. I'm sorry, more than covering them, what did God do? Now I want you to just think about this for a second. Before God covered them, what did he do? Let your mind just, you should be able to come to this conclusion. Before God covered them, what did he do? Vitaly important. Well, he made a sacrifice, yeah, yeah. Allow them to live, yes. Forgazing, yeah, yeah. What did he do? I need you guys to think about this. Matter of fact, where's Chris? Where's the rest of the Pentecostals in the chat? I need you all to, listen, this is shouting time. Let me drink my coffee so I can get some extra energy to chat with you. What, I'm not gonna move from this until you guys get this. Somebody's gonna get, oh, I hope somebody get this. I hope somebody get this. What did God do? Think about it for a second. I'll give you guys a few more seconds to think about this. What did God do? He went after them. He went to them. He came to them. He went looking for them. He pursued them. God could have stood right where he was. The Bible says that they heard him walking to them and they hid. God went to them. This is where, if we got some organs, Trey, I know we're not charismatic in Pentecostals, but dog, there should be some organs going in this thing. God went to them. He went looking after them, not the other way around. They didn't, which is like we do, they didn't go looking for God. We messed up. We ate the fruit. She ate it. No, he went to them. And why did he go? Did he go to them looking for retribution? Did he go looking to kill them? No, he went to them looking for reconciliation. Now, many of us would have went for retribution. God pulled up. He went looking for them. What does that tell you about God? And then after that, and then, yeah, there's consequences for what you did. There are going to be consequences for what you did, but then even in that, I'm going to make a way for reconciliation by means of this offering. We covered this before. I want you all to see, and by the way, they're still under the law. How is a person reconciled to God at this point in time? We're under the law. So how was God, how are they reconciled to God? Well, first and foremost, we have the day of atonement. On the day of atonement, we've got a priest that serves as mediator between mankind and God. He takes the sins of the people, confess them. Now, does he name every individual sin? No, he didn't name every individual sin, but the sins of the people are confessed on the head of the scapegoat and sent away out of the camp. Then blood is shed on the altar to make perpetuation of atonement for the people. God accepts it and so atonement is made and those who have humbled themselves afflicted their souls and in faith, they are now justified in right standing. So his love atones for mediates for God's just justness. Just justice, that's not a word, righteousness. So now they are in right standing. In the middle of all of this though, let's say between now and the next year, because it's right standing for one year, a person messes up. A person does wrong. A person sins. A person, I don't know, sleeps with his neighbor, his wife, neighbor's wife. Steals, lies, does something, right? I shouldn't say the steal, I'm labeled as neighbor's wife because you're in trouble then, but you sinned. Well, what does God offer for that person? What is there for the person who is messing up? You're in right standing with God for a year, but I've met, listen, these last three months, they've been doozies and I got a problem. So what did God give to them to also? Thank you, Christa. We've got these offerings. Remember to cover these offerings. This is by the way, this is also how we know that Cain was not responsible for the same type of offering that Abel and vice versa. So look what he does. We've got these different offerings. We won't go into all of them, but you can look on the scriptures where it says where, you can go and just look up more information about these. And so we've got a burnt offering. We've got a grain offering. We have a peace offering. We have a sin offering. We have a guilt offering. We've got all these different offerings. The burnt offerings, atonement for individual sin, grain offerings, expression of gratitude. Lord, I just love you. You're an awesome God. Here's a grain offering. There's a peace offering, expression of gratitude and desire of fellowship with God as a sin offering. Atonement for personal or national sin, unintentional or weak. And then there's a guilt offering. Atonement for specific sin against people, holy things, compensation. So we've got these different sin offerings. But now, when you look at these offerings, when you go back and look at them, there is a specific way to bring about these offerings, but they're not the same. What if I'm supposed to give sacrifice an animal and I'm poor? I don't have an animal. Well, you see that pigeon over there? Take that, offer that. So God has made a way for those who don't have certain things to also give an offering as well. What is God doing? He's giving you the opportunity to show, you know what? I am like Ahab. I'm broken. I'm torn up by this. Now, Ahab wasn't perpetually torn up. After a few days, he's back to being good ol' Ahab. And so the story ends for Ahab, that he does die and in that chariot, and he's bleeding, and what happens? The dogs come and lick up his blood. But for us, our sinfulness, because I have always thoroughly bothered and pleased to entertain the people who say, well, I don't sin. Christians, we don't sin, okay? One of the funniest things we would do, and I'll be honest, I took part in this. I took part in this. In prison, there's always somebody that says, I don't sin. I don't sin. I don't sin. No, no, no, it's Christians we don't sin. You know, these really, really self-righteous Christians in prison. Think about that. You're in prison and you are a self-righteous Christian. You are like, wow, I don't, yeah, I don't sin. Now they'll say, I learned my lesson. One guy, he's swarping down that he didn't do it. He swore, and it was just possible. It's possible you might've been railroaded. Might've been railroaded. The thing about being in federal prison is we all have access to everybody's paperwork. So if someone really wants to see what you did, then we can go find out. So some states have different prohibitions on getting information, but not in the feds. It's all public information. So anyway, this particular guy, I forget this guy's name. I wish I could remember his name just so I could say it. I'm sorry, but I don't sin. I don't sin. I don't sin. I don't sin, I'm a Christian. The Lord has changed me. I don't sin. He keeps the Sabbath, he keeps everything. He keeps all the, he keeps everything. Until we started having other guys, we just started, because when the word gets out that, hey, so-and-so says he's perfect, well, you're in prison, everybody sees you. And everybody sees your mess. And oh, did it come out. All the things he was doing still in this and that, having relationships with other inmates. You're not allowed to have relations with inmates. Relations with inmates is a no-no. I'm using the word relations. You all can figure this out. Mr. Holy, Mr. I don't sin. Yeah, so he kept, you could keep, you could keep the fees in prison. They do make a way for you to, especially in the feds, to observe your religious freedoms. They do. And by the way, you can make up your own religion. They literally have, there's a group of pagans that go, and they're different in every prison. Well, they go to the chapel and say, I'm a pagan, and I want my rights to observe my pagan religion. The biggest reason why they do that is because in the feds, you are also allowed to get a ceremonial meal once a year. And you can determine what it is. Well, the Christians is always fish. We got to eat fish for Easter. Our Easter meal is fish. The pagans, and it's only a few of them. And they get the same budget as everybody else. So they get steak. So you got guys that will, I want to be a pagan, so I can get steak. Yeah, it's a con, it's a grip. But anyway, but imagine being in prison and saying, I am a sinless creature. So it's almost like white fish. I don't know, it's just the prison thing. We just say fish. Me, I'm sick of eating fish in prison for Easter. Because the fish was never good. I'll take it back twice it was, but usually it was just, yeah. But being in prison and calling yourself sinless, it's like being a human being and calling yourself sinless. Being, it's like being a human being, calling yourself sinless. You have no need of Jesus. Because I didn't come to save you. I came to save them. You see that guy over there sitting down there who has got his head down and the guy beside him. You know, the Pharisee beating his chest. I thank God, I'm not like this guy. Well, Jesus didn't come for him. Jesus came for that guy, that bum. Yeah, that bum over there and this bum and all you. Yeah, I'm calling you bums. I ain't no bum. Yes, you are. You just don't know it. I'm here to help you. Have I become your enemy? Because I tell you the truth. Yeah, you're a bum. You know good, you're a bum. How dare you call me a bum? Hey, your mama's a bum. And your daddy. Corey and I wait and say, hold up, Corey. You can't, you're going too far. Listen, your mama's no good, your daddy's no good. How do I know? Because they're mom and their daddy was no good. All the way back to just like my mom and daddy was no good either. You don't know all. Listen, hurt your feelings if you want to. Go ask somebody. Go ask somebody that know your mother or that know your father when they were younger before you even thought of it. Wow, I didn't know my mom. Wow, I didn't know my daddy. Wow. Listen, it is what it is. You were born to a rotten group of people. We all were. And look where we got it from. Look where we got it from. A corrupt seed. But what God does is he shows his love just like when Adam and Eve sinned. It was God that went looking for them. Just like even when Ahab sinned, notice what God keeps doing with Ahab. Goes looking for him, sends someone to tell him about himself and he doesn't get it right. At a certain point in time, after all these warnings, after God being benevolent as he possibly can be, now it's time to pay the price. And so the point is, all from the very beginning to the very end, God has given people an opportunity to get right. You can never say that. Listen, I don't care what your doc on stand is. I don't care if you're Calvinist, if you're Arminian, if you are Provisions, if you are this, that and whatever else. God has given you the opportunity and you have said no. That is what it is. You will not have the opportunity to stand before the Lord and say, well, I could not, I didn't know. No, sorry, sorry. What you will do is you will go to hell. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. There will be regret. Do you know, do you know what weeping and gnashing? Listen, the Lord blessed me to one, see what weeping and gnashing of teeth looks like and then also to experience what weeping and gnashing of teeth feels like. You wanna see these big old guys that can bench press 400, 500 pounds, a bunch of them in prison that can bench press a house and squat two houses, tatted up all goals, tough guys running the brick walls and then landing their bunks, landing their sails crying and you hear them. Yeah, nothing but regrets. You get a glimpse of what the boarding pass looks like when they're on their way to hell. Now boarding flight 666 on their way to hell, all passengers headed to hell. The plane has been down boarding and no one wants, but you're getting on. You're getting on that plane. You are getting on that plane, you're on it, there's nothing, then you can do about it and you will cry and scream for the rest of your life. Go look at some of these videos where these people get sentenced to life, go to prison and they just cry. They don't know what to do with themselves. Think about that and then compare that with what it's gonna be like when you know there is no out date. There were guys that had 20 years, 30 years, 40 years. They at least had a date. At least had a date. Someone, some dates, it just had a letter D. Just had less death. I had a buddy of mine who was so fallen, so broken. This was 2008, we were having a conversation. His out date, ladies and gentlemen. His out date was 2086, 2086. This was 2008. So he had to do almost 80 years of prison before he got out. 80 years. He was resigned to the fact that I'm gonna die in prison. So I'm gonna still be here in 86. He was resigned to the fact that he was, that he's gonna die in prison. What he came face to face with was in his cell was that the Lord loves me and that's all I need. When he first got that 2086 out date, cause I don't know what's going through your mind in 2086, you can't even think, what is the, you have no idea what the world's gonna be like in 2086. They put him in a paper jumpsuit. Yeah, I don't know what a paper, some of you hope you don't know what a paper jumpsuit is. Paper jumpsuit is instead of getting regular prison clothes, you get a paper jumpsuit put in a dry cell. Why a dry cell? There can be no water in there because there's things you can do to yourself. You can kill yourself, all sorts of things that you put in a dry cell in a paper cell and you're monitored all night and the next day. Why so you don't kill yourself? The shock is so big. The shock is so awesome. So this guy don't kill himself. Now it's paper, you can see through it and they give you a little paper blanket that doesn't keep you warm because the temperature is cold which makes you even more frustrated. But you don't feel the cold because you're crying because you're broken. That's what he's telling us. And then he just said, Lord, what do you want? You got me. What do you want, Lord? At that moment, he just said, you know what? I'm through. I'll just serve you. If I gotta serve you in prison with an amen. If it took me coming here to keep me from going to hell with an amen. Good. So one day we were sitting in the band room. We were all in the little choir and then what we did was what happened was he walks in and I walk in. Actually I come in after him. He's crying. He is crying, but it's not like he's just in pain. He's crying like, he's got a smile on his face. What is the deal? What is the deal? Why are you doing this? He said, man, I gotta tell you something, Corey. I said, what's the deal? What's the problem? What's going on? He said, he said, read this. They let you know when they're getting you ready to go home so that you can go ahead and serve the rest of your sentence on paper. He's got three, what do you have? Three years or five years, I think, of paper, which is supervised release. He wasn't even worried about it. He comes in his cell and in the cell, it said, the paper that was laying on his bunk, someone had filed on his behalf and they reduced his sentence. Think about it, from 2086, he got out in 2010. Yeah, 10, 70, 76 years off your sentence. He wasn't thinking about it, wasn't worried about it. Matter of fact, he never talked about it. He never talked about his case and thinking anything about it. Yeah, so won't he do it? Yeah, and he said, and the whole point was this was, he recognized this as God getting him. He didn't run to God, but God ran him down. That's how he tells the story. That's what happened to Ahab. Ahab resisted. That's what happened to Kane. Kane resisted. That's what happened to Adam and Eve. That's also what happened to you. Thankfully, I believe I'm hopeful that you all didn't resist, but that just goes to show the love of God. That's just, that goes, so yeah, won't he do it? Yeah, he will do it. That just goes to show the love of God and the opportunity. So guys, as wicked as a person can be, they're never too wicked to where God can't come to them, where God can't show up. Now, he's gonna show up in most cases in the form of CG. He's gonna show up in the form of Brother Kevin and in the form of Miles. He's gonna show up in the form of Rodney and Lekisa. He's gonna show up in the form of Little Light. He's gonna show up in the form of you and me to extend some love, some grace. So I can go and tell somebody how much the Bible says this, the Bible says that, and be right. But the only reason why we study this stuff is so that we can turn around and share it with someone else. So guys, don't let that part also depart from you. We're not reading and studying just so we can be the smartest bunch of people on YouTube. That's not the goal. Or the smartest folks in our church. So that we can lead a Bible study in our own churches. That's not why we do this. We do this so that other people don't have, that other people don't have to go through what they have, has experience. Amen. Let me ask a couple of these questions. I do see a couple of questions. Okay. Corey, I know this is off topic, but how do you tell the difference between the Holy, between the Holy Spirit brings your sins to remembrance and Satan bring up all stuff? What could be both might do it? Now, here's the difference. If you're, and this is all you have to think about, if your sins, if you are reminded of your sins, then don't just stop there. Don't just be reminded of your sins. Be reminded of the consequences of your sins. The reason why David was broken, wasn't the sin, it was the consequence. And I don't wanna go through that again. I tell people, well, I don't need more, but in prison, I would say guys, I would be the biggest fool to go through what I've gone through and not get anything out of this, not learn anything, not growth. So the devil can bring your sins up fine. Doesn't mean anything if you're saved. And you might be reminded of your sin also because, hey, did you do that before? Now, God is not holding those over your head, but don't keep doing what you've been doing because you get the same result or even worse. I said this before, like with Jonah, God prepared a big fish. The next big fish he prepares might not be a whale, it might be a shark. Alrighty, oh, I already asked, why did Jesus speak in parables? Who is Jesus? We haven't covered Jesus yet. I'm kidding. Why did Jesus speak in parables? And we're not gonna do Q and A right now, guys, but why did Jesus speak in parables for them to know if he spoke plain, they would repent. Well, a couple of things. One, they may or may not have repented, but to make sure his word was veiled to them because he's dealing with a few select Jews and then he's gonna start dealing with Gentiles and then he's gonna, because remember, we have to step back prior to what he said previously, prior to what he said previously in the Old Testament concerning Israel. We're probably gonna cover a little bit of that tomorrow as we deal with the answers to the questions for the homework assignment. What is the correct spelling? I'm sorry, the correct pronunciation and spelling of this word. It's from the Tetragrammaton, is Yad, Hey, Wahey, or Y-H-W-H. What's the correct pronunciation? No one knows. Now we commonly say Yahweh, but there's just no way to know what the correct pronunciation is because there were no vowels. Yahweh seems to be the best and it does cut, and if you go along with how Hebrew was, that it might, it more likely it is Yahweh, but we don't know. I've heard other scholars say that it could be this, could be that. We just don't know. God is not interested in you being ever pronounced the correct way because first of all, what he's telling you in his name, he's really just telling you who he is. His name and truth be told, the name of Jesus is a name that we don't know fully yet. He's coming back with a name that no man knows. So, let me take one more question so this doesn't turn to a full-blown Q and A. First Timothy 3-6. And I'm just, I'm feeling good today. I'm gonna get off this thing though, I got something to do. First Timothy 3-16. By common confession, greatest mystery of Godliness, he is this one you're asking, he who was revealed in the Spirit, I mean revealed in the flesh, was vindicated in the Spirit, seen by angels proclaimed among the nations, believed on the world, taken the glory. So I would say that for me, this is pretty self-explanatory, but you're asking questions, so maybe it's not so much. The he, Jesus, he was shown to be in the flesh. The reason why it says he was revealed in the flesh, speaks to him being God in flesh, was vindicated in this word, being vindicated or righteous, going through everything that he needs, as shown himself to be righteous, needing no sin in the Spirit, was seen by angels, proclaimed among the nations, not just by angels, but by us as well, believed on in the world. And so taken up in glory. So here we have now, the person that was vindicated in the Spirit, who's also gonna do the same with us, making us righteous. And we will also at some point in time be taken up in glory. Amen, amen. All right, ladies and gentlemen, that was that. If you haven't gotten your homework done, go ahead and jump into it guys. I think it is not, I think I know it's a beneficial exercise, go and study, figure this out about people and their hearts being regenerated or the Spirit in someone's heart. Well, what about prior to when Jesus is making a statement? Does this also apply to Old Testament things? In other words, the questions are, was there regeneration in the Old Testament? Yes or no, if so, if yes, give scriptures. If no, give scriptures. And then also how did it work? If there was prior to the flood, how did regeneration work? If it was or was not after the flood, prior to the law, and then the same after the law. We're gonna cover this tomorrow, the Lord willing. And then maybe a couple other videos, another video as well. So in the meantime guys, look forward to seeing you. If you got any questions, I'm not answering your questions. I'm not answering your questions until tomorrow. God bless you all.