(Disclaimer: This transcript is auto-generated and may contain mistakes.)

Now, what we just read, Jeremiah chapter 1, was the introductory to a very long book in the Bible. In fact, the book of Jeremiah, by some calculations, is the longest book of the Bible. Because if you take Jeremiah and Psalms and put them side by side, although Psalms has 150 chapters, those chapters are a little bit shorter than the chapters in Jeremiah. So the 52 chapters of Jeremiah, if you look at how many pages the book of Jeremiah takes up in your Bible, and you look at how many pages the book of Psalms takes up in your Bible, the book of Jeremiah, by that estimation, is the longest book in the Bible. And so we're talking about a major book of the Bible. This is the introduction to that book, and it's always been one of my favorite chapters. This is where God's giving the initial instructions to Jeremiah. Obviously in chapters 2 through 52, we're going to get the meat of his prophecies, and we're going to get the story of his life and some of the things that he endures. But I love this introduction. I want to go through and show you a few things in here tonight. But the Bible says in verse 1, the words of Jeremiah, the son of Hilkiah, of the priests that were in Anathoth, in the land of Benjamin, to whom the word of the Lord came in the days of Josiah, the son of Ammon. And he explains basically the timing of when this prophecy came. Look at verse 4. Then the word of the Lord came unto me, saying, Before I formed thee in the belly, I knew thee. And before thou camest forth out of the womb, I sanctified thee, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations. Look at verse 6. Then said I, Ah, Lord God, behold, I cannot speak, for I am a child. But the Lord said unto me, Say not, I am a child, for thou shalt go to all that I shall send thee, and whatsoever I command thee, thou shalt speak. Be not afraid of their faces, for I am with thee to deliver thee, saith the Lord. And so right away God is trying to put some courage and put some boldness into Jeremiah here and to strengthen him and to get him to understand the importance of his mission, the importance of the word that he's going to preach. He said, Before I formed thee in the belly, I knew thee. So there's a couple things right there. Number one, you were in an accident, he said, I formed thee in the belly. Now I don't believe that God only formed Jeremiah in the belly, I believe that God forms every child inside of his mother's womb. Psalm 139 teaches the same thing. David talked about the fact that he was formed and fashioned in his mother's womb, that he was fearfully and wonderfully made. You know, science looks at what takes place in a woman's womb and they see that single cell split into two cells and into four cells. They can't explain it, they can't make it happen. You say, oh they can clone, they can create, no. All they can do, they can take something that's already alive, they can tamper with it. They can replace the DNA, they can mess around with it, they can pervert it. But they cannot create life and they cannot even fully explain or even come close to fully explaining that development in the womb. You know why? Because God is the one who's doing it, that's what the Bible says. That child that's in the womb is being formed and fashioned by God. He is designing that person to look a certain way and to have certain attributes that he has determined that that human being will have. Now think about that in light of, and this isn't what the sermon's about, think about that in light of abortion. You know, here God is, he's already opened the womb, he's already caused the miracle of life to begin. And yes it is a miracle because no scientist can make it happen. Frankenstein is a fiction, it's not reality. Man cannot create life as it happened in that movie with a lightning bolt. Even then he's using God's implement, the lightning bolt, but it's fiction. But as God is forming and fashioning this miraculous life that he created, that he chose to allow to come into existence because frankly when God doesn't want people to get pregnant they don't get pregnant. We see that throughout the Bible where he closed the womb and would not allow people to conceive. Other times we see him open the womb. It's up to him. And God is in the process of forming and fashioning a human being, a living thing made in the image of God, and then man comes in and violently snuffs out that life and murders it in cold blood. That's what abortion is. It's the cold blooded murder of God's creation, God's human life. I was this week and I turned on C-SPAN radio, which is where you can listen in to the government and debates and things, and I was listening to a senatorial debate between a Republican versus a Democrat. It was one of the Senate races and I can't remember the names of the two people involved. But they both were pro-choice, so-called. Both the Republican and the Democrat. And it's like in this debate, they were just trying to attack each other saying, well you're not as pro-choice as I am. And they asked these candidates, both of them, they said, when do you believe life begins? And both of them said, I believe life begins at birth. What kind of garbage, what kind of unscientific nonsense to say it's not alive? I mean it's alive by every scientific, I mean, they'll look at a plant and say it's alive. They'll look at a snail and say it's alive. They will look, I mean, what if they found one of these developing children on Mars? They'd say they found life on Mars. But they hypocritically just completely throw science and logic and reason out the window and say that something that's in the womb, I mean look, it's been proven that these children that are in the womb, if you play music, they're going to like that music after they're born. It's been proven in many scientific studies. And they would play music to that child in the womb. And then when it gets older, they'll say, which song do you like better? And they'll play the two songs and the one that they heard in the womb is the one that they prefer every time. Or at least enough times to show a statistical difference. So this child in the womb, and remember that when Jesus was in his mother's womb and John the Baptist was in his mother's womb, when the two came near each other, John the Baptist leaped in the womb. He was a living soul. He was aware of the fact that he was near the Lord Jesus Christ. They're listening to the music, they're listening to their parents' voices. I remember when my son Solomon was born, everybody was talking in the delivery room and then as soon as I spoke, he instantly went silent because he recognized that voice of his father that he'd heard for the last nine months in the womb. And so God is saying here, I formed and fashioned thee in the womb, number one. So he's saying, you're not an accident. You aren't the way you are by chance. I made you that way. And that goes for all of us here. You might not like the fag, I'm short, I'm tall. God made you the way you are. God created you the way that you are. And God believes that you are beautiful and that you are, you know, the way that you should be. He made you that way. But he says here, not only did I form thee in the belly, but he says, I knew thee and before thou camest forth out of the womb, verse 5, I sanctified thee, that means I set thee apart, and I ordained thee a prophet unto the nations. Now Jeremiah, he lacks a little bit of confidence here, he lacks boldness. And he says, ah Lord God, I cannot speak, I'm a child. And he doesn't want to do it. And he doesn't feel like he has the confidence to do it, he doesn't feel like he has what it takes to do it. But God tries to embolden him and say, no, don't you get it? I chose you, I formed you, I made you the way that you are, and I want you to do this job that I have for you. It's sort of like when Moses, when God came to Moses and wanted him to go confront Pharaoh, Moses said the same thing, I can't speak, I'm not a good speaker, I'm not eloquent, and God said, who made the tongue? Basically the same thing, I formed you. I know what your mouth can do, I'm the one who made your mouth, I'm the one who made your tongue, and I have chosen you to carry out this task and to carry out this work. And so here we see Jeremiah is very humble, God's trying to strengthen him and let him know that he is up to the challenge. He says in verse number 7 at the end there, he says, for thou shalt go to all that I shall send thee, and whatsoever I command thee, thou shalt speak. And that's what it is to preach, you preach God's word. It's not our word, it's not our opinion, it's God's word that's preached. He says in verse 8, be not afraid of their faces, for I am with thee to deliver thee, saith the Lord. You say, why did he say that? Because when you preach the truth unto people, people tend to give you a lot of dirty looks. I know when I've preached a lot of times, I'll be preaching and people will give me dirty looks and make faces at me. I mean, I'm not good at making the faces, but I've seen some pretty ugly faces from this pulpit, you know, making a face at me. And I always think of this verse every time, be not afraid of their faces. You know, and it usually just makes me just preach harder, you know, because I don't want to let that stop me and I'm going to show you a little bit later why. Look at verse number 8, it says, be not afraid of their faces, for I am with thee to deliver thee, saith the Lord. Jump over to verse 17. He says, thou therefore gird up thy loins and arise and speak unto them all that I command thee. And he says pretty much the same thing here. Be not dismayed at their faces, and look at the next phrase, lest I confound thee before them. Now that's an interesting phrase, because that's God saying, if you are afraid of their faces, I'll confound you before them. Now that is God basically threatening to make Jeremiah look like an idiot and look like a fool in front of everyone if he does not heed this warning to not be afraid of their faces. Here's what God's saying. You know, you're afraid, Jeremiah, of what people are going to think. You're afraid of the faces that they're making at you and you're afraid of what their reaction is going to be to your preaching, but he says if that's your mentality, if you're going to be a preacher who cares what people think and you don't just preach the word whether people like it or not, no matter what faces are made, he said I'll confound you before them. I'll make sure you get embarrassed, Jeremiah. I'll make sure that you fail. I will confound you before them. But he says if you are fearless as a preacher, he said I will be with you to strengthen you. I will bless you. You will succeed. Don't be afraid. Jump back over, if you would, to the beginning of the chapter. Look at verse number 9. The Bible says, Then the Lord put forth his hand and touched my mouth. Then the Lord said unto me, Behold, I have put my words in thy mouth. Now you say, Pastor Anderson, has God done that for you? No. God did not appear to me in this way and put his words in my mouth, but here's the thing. I have more of the word of God than Jeremiah had. I got the whole thing. I've got Genesis to Revelation and this book in my hand is a more sure word of prophecy according to the book of 1 Peter. This is a more sure word of prophecy and when I speak these words and when you speak these words, whether you are man, woman, boy, or girl, when you speak these words, you have God's words in your mouth and you don't have to be afraid. You don't have to fear what man thinks about it when you're quoting this word verbatim. You don't have to fear what man thinks or what man says. He says, I've touched thy mouth, and the Lord said unto me, Behold, I have put my words in thy mouth. And look at verse 10. Again he's trying to bolster Jeremiah's confidence. See I have this day set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms, to root out and to pull down and to destroy and to throw down, to build and to plant. Now look, right there God is telling this young man Jeremiah, who in his own words said, I'm a child. He tells this young man Jeremiah, you are above nations. He said, I have put you in a position that is higher than kingdoms or nations. He's saying kings are lower than you on the totem pole, do you see that? What he would be saying in today's vernacular is, you are above world leaders. You're above Barry Satoro. You're above Mitt Romney. And everybody today, the big deal is about these presidential candidates and the presidential debate and all the things surrounding that, and these people everywhere they go they're followed by people clicking cameras, thinking that these people are so important. I mean those are the people that today in America people would consider these guys are the most important people. And our fate depends upon them. Whether our country, and I've been hearing this a lot, have you been hearing this a lot lately? He said, don't you realize how important this election is? Our whole country is hanging in the balances. Who's heard that kind of rhetoric? Put your hand up. Our country is in the balances right now. We got to go out there and we got to influence this thing. But you know what? I don't buy it for one second. It's meaningless. You want to know what is holding our nation in the balance tonight. Oh, it's in the balance. Our nation is in the balance. Our nation is at the crossroads. Our nation is in the valley of decision. And there are very bad things that can happen in this country in the very near future. It has nothing to do with this election. It has to do with the men in the pulpits of America. They are the ones on whom everything depends. It doesn't depend on Barack Obama at all. It doesn't depend on Mitt Romney at all. It depends everything on the preacher, and I'm not saying this preacher, I'm saying every preacher. Every preacher in this country who stands up every week with the Word of God in their hand and a congregation of people before them ready to hear what the Lord has spoken, they are holding the fate of our country in their hand. What are they doing with it? Preaching lame sermons, being afraid of the faces of who's in the congregation, holding back on key truths because they're not sure how people are going to react when they hear it, censoring the sermon, sugar coating the sermon, not preaching hard on soul winning, not leading the charge, not knocking doors, not preaching controversial things, but preaching things that people want to hear, softening the message. Look there's a reason why our country is going through the things that it's going through. It's one word, sin. Sin. That's the problem. It's not a political solution. The problem is sin. When you live in a sinful society such as what we see with the abortion, one thing I touched on a little earlier in the sermon, when you see the sodomy and when you see the fornication and the adultery and the drunkenness and the sorceries of our nation and you see all the wickedness and filth and smut and sin and the whoredoms of our nation, we cannot prosper because God will not bless a nation that is not obeying His word. The Bible says blessed is the nation whose God is the Lord and if the Lord's not our God we're not going to succeed. It doesn't matter who's in the White House. It doesn't matter who wins that Senate race. It's meaningless and people today they're so focused on that what they need to get focused on is church. What they need to get focused on is preaching and to realize that the reason why our country is going down the wrong path is a lack of hard preaching, a lack of biblical preaching, a lack of men of God who are fearless and are willing to preach all the counsel of God, who are willing to preach what is popular and what is not popular. That's what we need and we don't just need one. We need an army of preachers like that. We need a church in every city. We need men that are in this room right now to decide, you know what, I will be another voice somewhere else. I will go to some other city and start another church and fill the void, fill the gap, stand in the gap before the Lord for this people and preach what needs to be preached. Look that is what we need. That is way more important. He said, look, you are a prophet, Jeremiah. You are preaching my word. I put my word in your mouth, therefore you are above leaders. Therefore you are more important than the president. You're more important than the king. You're more important than the ambassador. You're more important than this ruler or that ruler. Those men have no power at all except what God allows them to have and He will take it away from them someday. And I'm here to tell you that he that doeth the will of God abideth forever and long after all these men are burning in hell, the Bible believing preacher will be ruling and reigning on this earth with Jesus Christ along with all believers. And so don't get so focused on it. You know and there are people who get more focused on politics than on spiritual things and it's wrong. You say, well you're kind of like that Pastor Anderson. No I'm not. You don't know me very well. People think I'm really political or something. You know what? I'm way more focused on spiritual things than political. Do I follow politics? Yes. Am I interested in politics? Yes. But compared to biblical truth, it's virtually meaningless to me. It's more of an entertainment than anything really if you really get down to it anyway. The only reason I ever listen to that C-SPAN is just because I'm bored out of my mind on a long drive or something. I mean that's the only time I turn to it. But I'm here to tell you that the Bible says that preaching and preachers are above world leaders. More important. More pivotal. The Bible says if my people, which are called by my name, shall humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then will I hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and will heal their land. Notice God said the answer is with God's people, not with the heathen. So we need to understand that you, as a Bible-believing Christian and a Bible-believing preacher who carries forth God's Word, you may not be the pastor of the church, that's not the point. You preach the Gospel from house to house. You preach the Gospel unto your family and your children. You preach the Gospel unto your friends and co-workers. You preach the Gospel every chance you get. You know what? You have more importance and more value in the eyes of God. You are higher on the list than these world so-called leaders. He said, let this sink in. Verse 10, I've set thee this day, I've set thee over the nations and over the kingdoms to root out and to pull down and to destroy and to throw down. Man, this sounds like a really positive message he's going to be preaching. Here's your job, Jeremiah. Number one, you're going to root out. Number two, you're going to pull down. Number three, you're going to destroy and number four, you're going to throw down. Now is this what's going on across America today, Sunday morning and Sunday night and Wednesday night in many churches? No, it's not. But let me tell you something, there's a lot that needs to be rooted out. There's a lot that needs to be thrown down. There's a lot that needs to be destroyed and look what he says next, to build and to plant. But you know what, you can't build and plant until you've demolished what's there. You know, I've worked on construction sites where an old building is demolished and then you come in and build the new building. Can you imagine if partway through the demolition somebody came in and just started building the new building? I mean, that's confusion. See in order to teach people the truth, sometimes you have to tear down some false ideas. You have to tear down some lies. You have to root out some deep rooted beliefs in people that are wrong in order to be able to build and plant what needs to be preached. See, Jeremiah's preaching was not a totally negative message. There are many positive things in the book of Jeremiah. There's negative and positive, but God gave him twice as much negative as he did positive. If you look at that verse, he gave him four negatives and two positives to preach. Let's keep reading. He says in verse 11, "'Moreover the word of the Lord came unto me saying, Jeremiah, what's seest thou? And I said, I see a rod of an almond tree. Then said the Lord unto me, thou ist well seen, for I will hasten my word to perform it. And the word of the Lord came unto me the second time saying, what seest thou? And I said, I see a seething pot, now a seething pot is a boiling pot, and the face thereof is toward the north. And the Lord said unto me, out of the north an evil shall break forth upon all the inhabitants of the land. For lo, I will call all the families of the kingdoms of the north, sayeth the Lord, and they shall come and they shall set everyone his throne at the entering of the gates of Jerusalem, and against all the walls round about, and against all the cities of Judah. And I will utter my judgments against them, touching all their wickedness, who have forsaken me and have burned incense unto other gods, and worship the works of their own hands.'" Now, that right there is a fitting introduction to the book of Jeremiah because that's pretty much what the book of Jeremiah is about. God kind of sums it all up there in just a few scriptures from verse 14 to verse 16. He explains to us the meaning of the book of Jeremiah. He's saying your message to the children of Judah is this, foreign invaders will come and destroy your nation, they will rule over you, you will be demolished, and you will be taken out of this land captive. And he's saying it's because of your sin. It's not because you didn't have a big enough military. It's not because you didn't have enough weapons. It's not because you didn't have thick enough walls. He's saying because of your whoredoms, because of your witchcraft, because you have worshipped false gods, this is what the whole book of Jeremiah is going into. Because of these sins, you will be punished and my judgment will come upon you. So it's not a very positive message overall. It's a message of rebuke. It's a message of telling the people of Judah that their sins have reached unto heaven and that they will pay the price on this earth for their sins and that their nation will be invaded, it will be destroyed. Now can you imagine if Jeremiah the prophet were here among us today? Let's say that Jeremiah were in our midst today. Let's just try to understand this a little bit, what this prophecy means. What if Jeremiah came on the scene today and he said, Thus saith the Lord, and he explained that because of the wickedness of the United States, because of the abominations, because of the witchcrafts and the whoredoms and worshipping other gods, he said, Thus saith the Lord, and he explained a foreign invader is going to come. And it was a world power. So let's say he said the Chinese. Let's just pick them because they're a major world power today, right? What if Jeremiah came along today and said, You know what? Communist China, because of your wickedness, is going to come in here and invade this nation and you will lose. You will be defeated. They will rule over you. They will bring their throne and set up their throne in the United States and rule and reign over the United States. They will kill you and destroy your armies and they're going to rule over you. They're going to be the boss and it's your fault because you've sinned because of your ungodliness. Now do you think that that would be a popular message today if somebody preached that? And I'm not saying that's going to happen. I don't believe it. I'm not a prophet where God's given me some special revelation or anything. I don't know what's going to happen. I know what's going to happen in the book of Revelation. Maybe we're living in those days. I don't know. But I'll say this, if that message were here today, that wouldn't be a popular message. And you know what they did when they heard this message from Jeremiah? They became very angry. They accused him of treason. They said you are aiding and abetting the enemies of Judah. You're strengthening the enemy. This is what they said, you're a foreign spy. You've been sent here to weaken the hands of the men of war. You've been sent here to basically give a defeatist attitude unto our nation and they threw him in prison. They persecuted him. They punished him. They treated him miserably. They starved him of food in prison to where he was on bread and water and then eventually he wasn't even getting the bread. He was getting nothing. Starving in a dirty, filthy prison cell for preaching this word. So I mean this is a message that people did not want to hear. Now if a preacher were to get up today, and look I'm not preaching that message, I don't know what's going to happen, but I will preach this. I will preach a message similar to what Jeremiah said. Our nation will be judged and destroyed. I'm not saying a foreign invader is going to come in. I'm not saying who that would be, but I promise you our nation will be destroyed and judged for our sins. Otherwise, I like what one preacher said, if God doesn't judge us, he's going to have to apologize to Sodom and Gomorrah, you know what I mean? Throughout history he has judged nations such as ours. Now the popular preachers of today, they will get up and say that America is the greatest nation in the world, we are God's chosen people, I mean God blessed the USA, God shed his grace on thee. I mean that is the popular message that's being preached today, that basically the United States is being blessed by God, we are a righteous nation, we are godly, we are a Christian nation, but here's the problem with that, it's all lies, it's not true. Now I do believe that in many ways this country has been a great nation in the past, and has been a God-fearing nation in the past, and has stood up for a lot of godly things and godly principles, but I'm sorry, and you say you're not patriotic. No I'm not. So what are you going to do about it? You're not patriotic. No I'm not, because I stopped being patriotic when my country started using my tax dollars to murder children, and murder babies. I stopped loving America at that point. And when our country enshrined homosexuality, and when all of our leaders, Republican and Democrat, praised homosexuals, they lost me, they lost my support. Our government has totally lost my support. What do you want me to say? You want me to say I love homos? You want me to say that I love abortion? I love murder. I love filth and wickedness. I love smut and perversion. I love leaders who commit adultery with their secretaries in the Oval Office and don't get punished. That's great. It's wonderful when our leaders get up and praise false gods, and praise the gods of Islam, and praise the gods of Hinduism, and praise the false gods of our world. Oh I think that's great. God bless America. Yep, that red, white, and blue. But you know what? All throughout history everybody is brainwashed by their government to think that their country can do no wrong. And to think that their government can do no wrong. And to believe that in every war, and in every battle, and in every conflict, and in every situation around the world, we are always right because we're America. Now look, if we were God-fearing, Bible-believing people anymore, that would probably be true. But when we're going around promoting murder, and faggots, and filth, and sin, God will not bless America. You can say it all you want. You can sing it in the song. It's a lie. It's not real. It's not real when we hate the word of God as a nation, and when we've kicked it out of the schools, and when we've kicked it out of government buildings, then the Ten Commandments cannot be posted, and the Ten Commandments cannot be taught, and the Lord Jesus Christ is not honored. I mean look, this is how obvious it is folks. Wake up. Wake up today America. Your country is not the country that it used to be. Your country is no longer a Christian nation, it's a heathen nation. That's the truth today. You say, why do you preach this? Well, why did Jeremiah preach this way? He told the truth. He said, you know what Judah, you used to be God's people, now you've gone after other gods and you're going to be punished. You used to be the nation that was blessed by the Lord in the days of David, and in the days of Solomon, the Lord was blessing you, but now you've gone after other gods, and He is no longer blessing you. His wrath is on you. That's what He told them, and that's what I'm telling you today, that God's wrath is on a nation that murders children. God's wrath is on a nation that promotes sodomy. God's wrath is on a nation that does not honor and glorify the Lord Jesus Christ. You say we have Christian leaders, which of our leaders will stand up and preach the Gospel of Jesus Christ? Which of our leaders will stand up in the Congress or the Senate or in the White House or in the United Nations and stand up and say, let me tell you something, the Lord Jesus Christ died on the cross, He was buried and 3 days later He rose again, and faith in Jesus will save you and you'll go to heaven. And if you don't believe in Jesus, you will spend eternity in hell. Will any of our leaders preach that message? Any of them? One of them? Have you ever heard that message? You say, well that would not be appropriate. Oh really? They preach all their beliefs about everything else, they get up and blah blah blah blah and talk about everything else under the sun. And you know what? It's funny because in the United Nations when these Muslims come in, they preach the Gospel of Islam. You know, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the president of Iran, he gets up in the United Nations General Assembly and says, you know, before I explain anything else, let me explain to you what I believe. And he goes into just basically Islam. And he's talking about Abraham and Moses and Jesus and Mohammed. And look, it's a false gospel that he believes. But isn't it amazing how the leader of Iran gets up and says, you know what? Here's what I believe. Here's what my religion teaches. But our leaders don't even say a word about it. Oh, they'll say God bless America. Because that's just a vague, just God. Oh, we believe in God. We fear God, or gods, whatever. But when do they get up and say, you know what, I believe that the Bible is God's word. And look, I'm not saying that they're trying to combine that with the government or have a religious government. I'm just saying, they're interviewed about everything they believe. Why don't they just say, you know what, I believe every word of that Bible. I believe that heaven's real and hell's real and really no man cometh unto the Father but by Jesus Christ. You got to be saved through Jesus. You know what? Otherwise you're going to split hell wide open. And you know what? Preachers won't even say that anymore. Famous preachers of our day, Franklin Graham, the son of Billy Balaam, the son of Billy Graham, he was interviewed lately and they said, you know, are Mormons Christian? I won't answer that. I won't get into that. And the host said, no, people want to know. You're a pastor, you're a preacher, whatever. And they said, you know, people want to know. Do you consider Mormons Christians or not? And he said, I don't want to get into that. I won't answer that. He asked him like six, seven times, he just refused to answer that. What a wimp. What a phony. What a fraud. What a heretic. This is what we're dealing with today. Leaders who want nothing to do with the Word of God, who want nothing to do with the Lord Jesus Christ, who want nothing to do with righteousness and godliness. Our country today has begun to promote values that are not biblical and Christian values. We want to go to the Middle East and obviously, look, Islam is a false religion, but they're not bringing them the Gospel of Jesus Christ. Somebody who went over there told me they were prohibited from soul winning to the Arabs. They were prohibited from giving them Bibles. They were prohibited from telling them about Jesus. What we're doing over there, we're basically going over there and bringing them women's rights. I wish they'd never showed up here. And now we're bringing them over there? But sorry to confuse you with biblical reasoning. But anyway, let's go back to the Bible here. I could preach on that all night, that's a whole sermon. But anyway, I just wanted to kind of bring that into perspective, what Jeremiah's message was. Jeremiah's message was, sorry, you think you're God's chosen people, you think that you're basically under his blessing, but because of your disobedience to his word, you're now under a curse, you're now under his wrath. And yes, there was a righteous remnant, but the majority of the Jews here had turned away from God and so they're going to be judged by his wrath. So I was just trying to kind of bring it into the present day so you kind of understand the type of message. And look, what I just preached for the last 10 minutes probably angered some people. People might bristle when they hear some of that, but you know what, do you think they bristled when Jeremiah said that kind of stuff? Not defend, but prove anything I just said in the last 10 minutes wrong with the word of God. It's all biblical. But here's what he says in verse 18, he says, For behold I have made thee this day a defensive city, and an iron pillar, and brazen walls against the whole land, against the kings of Judah, against the princes thereof, against the priests thereof, and against the people of the land. And they shall fight against thee, but they shall not prevail against thee, for I am with thee, saith the Lord, to deliver thee. Now Jeremiah 1.18 is one of my favorite verses in the Bible. Let me just show it to you again. For behold I have made thee this day a defensed city, and an iron pillar, and brazen walls against the whole land, against the kings of Judah, against the princes thereof, against the priests thereof, and against the people of the land, and they shall fight against thee, but they shall not prevail against thee, for I am with thee, saith the Lord, to deliver thee. I love the imagery here. He's saying, Jeremiah, you are one man. You are a young man. But he's saying, I have made you a defensid city. Think about that. I mean, one man. Think about a defensid city. Think about a city with walls, a fortress. And you know, there have been some fortresses throughout history that have withstood some pretty serious attacks. Think about, you know, remember the Alamo, okay? You know, but the Alamo is one example of where a really small force held out against a much greater invading army, you know, of Santa Anna's forces. But there have been many, many stories like that and historical accounts of just very few people within those walls, within that fortress, holding off a great advantage. He says to Jeremiah, I've made you a defensid city. I mean, you're standing, and look, did Jeremiah have armor on? No. Did Jeremiah have a shield in his hand? Did he have weapons in his hand? Was he surrounded by bodyguards? Nope. One flesh and blood man, anyone who wants to could just walk up and kill him. But he stands to preach in front of a hostile crowd and God said, don't be afraid of their faces because I've made you a defensid city. Although man can't see it, you are as secure as a city that's well fortified with walls around it. He said, I've made you an iron pillar. He's saying you're like a rock. He's saying and brazen walls against the whole land. You are like a city that is surrounded by walls of brass. I mean, imagine the fortitude there, imagine the strength. And he says, against the kings of Judah, against the princes thereof, against the priests thereof, and against the people of the land. Now look, that's against a lot of people. He's saying you're going to have a lot of enemies. So if you were to 1 John 5, 1 John 5, toward the end of the New Testament, 1 John 5. It's like when Paul said that he had a great door open before him, an effectual, but he said there are many adversaries. There are many enemies. And when you preach the truth and when you speak the truth, there are many adversaries. There are many enemies. Many people don't want to hear the truth. Many people would rather wrap themselves in the American flag and say, you know what? Everything we do is right. I trust our leaders. I trust that they will only torture the right people. I trust that they will only bomb the right people and murder the right people. I trust what they will do with the money that I send them every week. I believe it's being used for the causes of truth and justice and liberty throughout the world. You know, there are people who believe that today. I don't understand how they can believe that. And when you look at our leaders today, just look at the people that are running our country. Are they godly? Do they love Jesus? Do they love the Bible? Do they live their lives in accordance with the Word of God? Do they honor the Lord? Do they mention the Lord Jesus Christ other than just maybe as a little campaign slogan where it has nothing to do with how they believe or live their lives? Look, how could you believe, listen to me, how could you believe that leaders like that would be doing good things? A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Okay? And so don't be offended by the truth tonight. You need to stop getting so wrapped up and so caught up in the patriotism and so caught up in this pro-America, pro-government thing. And look, I'm not promoting our enemies today, I'm promoting the Word of God and the Lord Jesus Christ. And I cannot support wicked people, I won't do it. And if you support them, you are part of their sin, you are part of their iniquity. That's why I don't support them. And that's why I want nothing to do with them. I will not have anything to do with the leaders of our nation. Because they are not my leaders. Jesus is my only King at this point. Now, the whole world is going to be against you when you start preaching the Word of God, no matter what the message is. You start preaching that salvation is by grace through faith, there's a lot of people against you. You start preaching that the Bible has no errors in it, you're going to have a lot of adversaries, that's not a popular message. You preach anything you want out of this book and there are going to be a lot of people against you, but God said, don't be afraid of that. You're like a defense city, you're like a brazen wall, you are like an iron pillar. Now look at 1 John chapter 5, this is another great passage. It says in verse number 4, for whatsoever is born of God overcometh the world. And this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. Now look at that, isn't that a pretty big obstacle to overcome, the world? I mean we're not talking about overcoming one nation, or overcoming one enemy, or overcoming one trial, or overcoming one tribulation. He says no, we're talking about overcoming the world. And he says, this is the victory that overcometh the world, even our faith. He says, who is he, verse 5, that overcometh the world, but he that believeth that Jesus is the Son of God. Now what I want to point out there is that the entire world around you has an agenda today. Are you listening? And that agenda is to stop people from believing that Jesus is the Son of God. That's the agenda. That's the agenda of our nation. That's the agenda of our world. That's the agenda of our leaders in government. That is the agenda of Hollywood. That is the agenda of the music industry. That is the agenda of the public school system. That is the agenda of the magazine and newspaper publishers. They all are part of the world. You say, what's the world? It's everything that's not of the Father is of the world. Everything that's not of Jesus, everything that's not Christian, everything that is not biblical is the world. And the Bible says that in order for a person to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ as their Savior, in order for a person to believe that Jesus is the Son of God, they have to overcome all that. Because everything is geared toward stopping them from believing. You see, the public school system today is there, and again, run by who? Our government. That you apple pie eating, patriotic one, think is so wonderful, our government teaches that there is no God. And you can say whatever you want that they talk about God, but they teach that the world came from the Big Bang. That's not God. Are you listening? Anyone who believes in the Big Bang does not believe in God. Period. I don't care what you say. You say, oh they believe in God and the Big Bang. No they don't. They believe in the Big Bang instead of God. Because the Big Bang is a theory that's there for one reason. To explain how the world could even be here without God. That's the purpose of the Big Bang theory, is to show you how all this could exist. Because any rational, reasonable person looks around and says, where did all this come from? Who made all this? Who made us? If we are so intelligent, which we are as humans, there must have been someone even more intelligent who made us. We could not have come from nothing. But the Big Bang is a theory, and it's nonsense, but the Big Bang is there to explain how we got here. But here's the thing. Our government schools teach the Big Bang as fact. Whether it be kindergarten, elementary, junior high, high school, or college, our government schools teach that the Big Bang is fact. Your tax dollars that you pay for go to the training of children that there is no God. As fact. Not as an opinion, not here's a scientific theory, no no no. When I was in public school in 6th grade at 11 years old, our teacher stood up in front of the class and said, you know what, how many of you are Christians in here? I put up my hand. He said, you know what, that's fine, but I'm here to tell you evolution's a fact whether you're Christian or not. And he said, I don't care whether you believe in it or not, it's true. The Big Bang is a fact. And he said, if you don't believe it, you're an idiot. That's what the teacher said in public school. See, he said, how dare you, Pastor Anderson, to expect our leaders to get up and proclaim the Lord Jesus Christ as the God of the universe. Well they don't proclaim that because they don't believe that, number one. Because they believe in the Big Bang, they believe in evolution. But number two, it's amazing how they proclaim their religion as fact. And let me tell you something, this atheism that is taught in our public school system as fact, the Big Bang, evolution is how we got here, let me tell you something, it is a religion. It's a religion. If you ever get around people who really know a lot about it, who are science geeks and science nerds, and you know these guys, you know what I'm talking about. If you get around them, it's a religion. Now first of all, I've never listened to any of these people talk, whether it was a science class or whether it was just in a personal conversation or whether it was listening to a program on the radio or something, without frequent references that these people make toward things like time travel, a lot of references to Star Trek, I'm not kidding, a lot of references to Star Wars, a lot of references to things that are just total fairy tales, just made up things, and they literally believe in this stuff. Space time, yes, space time, the space time continuum, you know. And look, this stuff is not true, it's not science. How can you say that the whole world came from nothing? And look, they will say to you, and look, it was told me when I was 11 in public school, and you know as well as I do, that any science professor and any of our world leaders, if you tell them, I don't believe in the big bang, I don't believe in evolution, they'll tell you you're an idiot. Will they not use that word? They'll say you're an idiot. They believe that I'm an idiot today. They believe I'm uneducated today. Because if you don't believe that this whole world came from nothing, you're an idiot. You're an idiot. Because any smart person would know that nothing produces all this. And if you don't believe that, you're an idiot. But see this is the religion of atheism, it's a religion. See it'd be smarter if they just said we don't know what, we don't know how we got here. We don't know what's going on. We don't believe in the Bible, but we don't know what's going on. That would make a lot more sense. But to sit there and say we know for sure, we've proven, we've proven that the whole world came from nothing. Einstein proved it. I mean how do you prove that? And here's what they say, and look, the big bang theory, that's what it teaches, because the big bang theory teaches that the whole universe was crammed into a space smaller than a single proton. So small of a dot. I used to think the big bang was like a really big bang. I thought that's why it was called that, you know. But no, no, it's really small. So they believe that the mass of the universe was all jammed, I mean we're talking earth, the sun, the moon, the stars, everything, was all crammed in this little dot that was so small that the mass was basically zero. But it was just a hair above zero. It was just like a little tiny, smaller than a proton, it just wasn't quite zero, because I mean I guess there had to be something there. And then the energy was like infinity. The energy was like infinity, the mass was like zero. And then it just like exploded. All that energy just exploded and turned into mass. And in one trillion trillionth of a second, it expanded to the current size of the observable size of the universe. You know, they say it's still expanding, but what we see right now, it was that big and a trillion trillionth of a second. You know, all the light years and all that kind of stuff. So that all happened in a trillion trillionth of a second, right? And if you don't believe in this, you're an idiot, you're stupid if you don't believe that. If you believe that everything you've ever seen in the whole universe and in this world was all crammed into a dot so small that you couldn't even see that it's so small, then you are ignorant, you're uneducated, you're an idiot. Well, you know what? Here's my religion. If you don't believe in God, you're an idiot. Because the Bible says the fool that said this heart, there is no God. So this is what our government is teaching today. They teach that mankind came from apes and apes came from lower life forms and lower life forms. Well, we don't know where they came from. But the big bang happened and things started coming to life eventually. You know, and those things came to life and they just slowly kept getting more advanced until they turned into us. And look how smart we are. And you know, people are deluded to think that God created it, you know, but really anybody who believes in God is ignorant and a fool and uneducated and stupid. So that's what the government school system is there to teach you. Is that a message that's compatible with the Bible? No. That Jesus is the Son of God? No. Okay. Then TV is out to teach you the same thing. TV is out to make fun of Christianity. So they put Christians and preachers on TV that are effeminate, that are weak, that are sissy, that are very lame, and then they put other preachers on TV, like this guy from Westboro Baptist, Fred Phelps, this inbred weirdo with all of his weird hillbilly backward family, you know, and this is what Christianity is. This is what somebody is who's against homos, it's this guy. You're like this weird, backward, inbred, you know, I don't even know what else do you say about these people? They put this out there like if you're a Christian and you take the Bible literally, you're this guy. And you're like, I don't want to be that guy. And then they show all these effeminate as hell preachers like Joel Osteen. They show all these weak little sissy, every TV show, whenever there's a pastor in the show, he's always weak. Have you noticed that? He's weak. They blaspheme God, they blaspheme Jesus, even the cartoons. They make fun of Jesus, they make fun of the Bible, they make a mockery of the things of God. Then you turn on the radio and listen to the world's music and again it's blaspheming Jesus, it's making fun of God, it's attacking the things of God, it's attacking the Bible. So you've got science, falsely so-called, you've got TV, you've got movies, you've got government schools, you've got the books, you've got the newspapers, the Bible says this whole world has an agenda to keep you from getting saved, to keep you from believing on Jesus, to keep you from believing that Jesus is the Son of God. And God says the one who overcomes the entire world is the one who believes that in spite of the fact that it's on attack from all sides. I mean the person who believes the Bible has to overcome what they've learned in school. I mean when you're out soul winning, you want to know what you're overcoming at that door? You're overcoming government schooling. You're overcoming Hollywood brainwashing. You're overcoming TV brainwashing. You're overcoming false religion. You're overcoming the world's religions, Buddhism, Hinduism, Catholicism, Mormonism, all these false doctrines that are out there to prove to people that salvation is not what God said it was by grace through faith. You have to overcome all of that just in order to get saved. You have to be able to push out the science out of your mind, that garbage, that lie that they call science. You have to push out of your mind false religion that you've been brainwashed. You have to push out of your mind what the TV and movies have taught you, what you learned on the video The Passion of the Christ or whatever other film that perverts the Scriptures. You have to put all that out of your mind, you have to overcome all of it just to be saved, just to believe on Christ, just to believe the most basic truth that Jesus is the Son of God. You're overcoming a lot, right? Let me explain something to you. Now that you're saved, because I'm preaching to people that are already saved, now that you're saved, do you think that the battle's over or something? I mean, do you really think that the whole world's out against you, but now that you're saved, now that you're preaching the Bible, you're going to be popular now? No, you're still going to have all those forces working against you all the time. God told Jeremiah, that's why you need to be fortified. That's why you need to be strengthened. That's why I'm going to make you a defense city, because you're going to be under attack from all sides. You're going to be assaulted from all sides. And don't you just feel it in your daily life, the assault? I mean, you get up in the morning, you go out to live your life. It's funny, I just went to buy a toy for my child and I walk into the toy aisle and it's just like everything's ungodly. It was like I was just trying to find a normal toy. And I'm just looking and looking and everything. Everything's just these weird, these girls with all, it's like a toy for a little kid and it's like a girl in a miniskirt with real weird eye makeup and a real creepy, scary looking face. And then it's all these toys like brats or whatever, and it's just these rebellious women and rebellious girls in miniskirts. Then it's like, oh there's some musical toys, this looks good. And there's like a keyboard, a little toy keyboard, a little toy guitar, and every single one, it's like you push the button on every one of them and it's just like rap and rock and you know. I'm like, oh this will be nice, and then you turn it on and it's just like. It's just like all this. It's like, sorry, I don't want my kids to grow up and listen to Dr. Dre and Snoop Dogg. And then it's like I walk over to another section and it's just all these dinosaurs and all this weird evolution based thing. And look, I believe there were dinosaurs, the Bible talks about them. By the way, the Bible was talking about them before these idiots had ever even discovered them. Behemoth and Leviathan ring a bell? But honestly, it's all from a bad stand, it's all false, the ones that they portray, of course. And you know, I'm just going through, it's just like everything, and then everywhere you look there's this nude, you know, half nude women advertised in the store. You know, the music's playing over the speaker that's everything that's worldly and sinful and ungodly. Look, there's just a lot against us today. There's a lot against us. And God tells us, you know what? You need to stand tall, you need to stand on what you believe, everybody's going to be against you, the whole world's fighting against you, Jeremiah. The leaders, they don't like you, Jeremiah. The nation doesn't like you either, but he's saying, fear not Jeremiah, I've made you an iron pillar, I've made you a brazen wall, I've made you a defense city. I love what David said in Psalm 3, he said, I will not be afraid, though ten thousands of people set themselves against me round about. He said if ten thousand people come after me and surround my house, I'll fear no evil because God's with me. You know, and what I'm trying to say with this sermon, and you know, I basically just wanted to give you a little overview of the book of Jeremiah tonight and just that introduction, but let me just put it to you this way. You know, God created us all for a special purpose. Just like he created Jeremiah with a plan in mind and a purpose in mind, he gave him the abilities and talents he needed to do the job that needed to be done. Not everybody's going to be a pastor, not everybody's going to be a preacher, but God created us all and he created us all not to go with the flow of this world. Are you listening? Not to just go with the flow and live our lives and to be a part of this world and to go after the things of this world. God put us here to swim upstream. That's why we're here on this earth. To be a peculiar people, to be different, and to fight against these lies. To fight against atheism and to fight against the ungodliness of our nation. Don't get sucked into it and be a part of it. I see so many Christians, they get sucked in with the world's mentality. It seems like this political season, and that's why I kind of focused on that a little bit in the sermon tonight, this political season seems to be, it unites Christians with unbelievers to fight for a cause that doesn't even matter. And it gets them to, because of fear, because of fear now, to put aside everything that they believe and to start making excuses for wicked people. I mean you've heard it. You try to point out the wickedness, well, well, he's not that, you know, and they start excusing people who are pro-abortion. They start excusing people that are pro-Homo. They start excusing people for all their wickedness and ungodliness, because they just get wrapped up in all the patriotism, they get wrapped up in the election, they get wrapped up in the excitement, and you know, frankly, I'm not on either side of this thing, because I think it's all wicked. Both sides are wicked, as far as I'm concerned. That's my position, so I'm not promoting either candidate. I'm not promoting any candidate, because you know what? It's all, it's all in the same category as far as I'm concerned. There's not a big enough difference today, are you listening to me? There's not a big enough difference in the candidates for me to give a rip about it one way or the other, and yet I'm being bombarded by Christians on all sides telling me I need to get involved in this election, I need to get involved in this campaign. You know what? I'm not going to get involved. I'll be out-soul-witting. I'll be preaching the Word of God. I'm not going to get involved in it, because you know what? I'm here to preach the unpopular message that Jeremiah preached, that this country is going to hell in a handbasket because of sin and wickedness, and until pastors get up and scream and yell about it, and throw a fit about it, and get mad about it, nothing's going to change. Until God's house changes, the world's not going to change. Judgment must begin at the house of God. And I'm here to tell you something today. We as Christians are never going to be popular when we stand up for what's right. You're never going to be popular, but let me tell you something. God will defend you. God will protect you. And I've been attacked, I've been assaulted both physically and verbally, but you know what? God's going to protect me and God's going to protect you too. Don't ever let them get to you with the fear and everything like that. Just stand tall, speak the truth, and God will protect you. God created you, God loves you, to God you're more important than these other people. I mean, my children are more important to me than people that are not my children. And we as God's children, as God told Jeremiah, are very important to him. Keep that in perspective in these coming months. You know, keep in perspective that our kingdom's not of this world. It's the kingdom of God, it's the kingdom of heaven. And be sure that that's what you're standing on. Then you're a defense city, then you're a brazen wall. You start defending these political parties that are both ungodly, that are both as wicked as the devil. You know, you start promoting that and you're going to find yourself on the wrong side. You're not on the Lord's side. And I'm telling you, and look, I'm probably going to get a lot of flack for this, and I don't preach on this stuff all the time. I'm just covering it tonight because the election's coming up, I want to cover it. Because I feel like it's my job as a spiritual leader to at least state what I believe on this. And I'm here to tell you right now, I am not voting in this election. And a lot of people will say, you're not right with God! And 99% of Baptist preachers will tell you, you're not right with God, God commands us to vote. Show me. Now I'm not from Missouri, but let me tell you something. I want you to show me. Show me in the Bible where I'm commanded to vote. I challenge you. Show me in the Bible where I'm supposed to pick the lesser of two evils. I got the Bible right here. Show me in the Bible where if I don't vote I'm not right with God and I can't complain. You can't complain if you don't vote. Choose Coke or Pepsi now. I don't drink Coke or Pepsi, it's the same drink. If you think Coke and Pepsi are two different drinks, you know, you're a sucker. Because let me tell you something, it's the same drink. You know, milk, that's a different drink. Orange juice, water, you know, there's a big difference between Coke and Pepsi. It's high fructose corn syrup. It's sodium benzoate. It's carbonated water in caramel color. It's the same thing. But they deceive you that it's different. You know, both Coke and Pepsi are very bad for you. They are. My grandmother used to never let me drink Coke because she said, she said if you put a tooth in a glass of Coke in a couple days the tooth will be gone. She said it will dissolve that tooth. You know, and she said it's not good for you, you know. And I don't care if you drink Coke and Pepsi, that's not the point. But the point is that's not a nutritious beverage. Nobody's going to tell you that's a healthful beverage. But they want you to believe that that's the only choices. Forget milk, forget water, forget juice, nope, Coke or Pepsi. Oh, you don't like Coke? You must like Pepsi. You're one of those Pepsi supporters. Oh, you don't like Pepsi? You love Coke, don't you? Admit it, you love Coke. And that's what people say, oh you're not for Romney, you're for Obama then. By not, this is what they'll tell you, by not voting for Romney, you're voting for Obama. Who's heard that one? If you don't vote for Romney, you're voting for Obama. You don't vote for Obama, that's a vote for, no it isn't, it's a vote for nobody. So one of these idiots told me, they said if you don't vote for Romney in this election, you're voting for Obama by doing that. And I said, okay, how about this, how about if I decide that I like Obama better, and then I stay home, then by staying home, I'm actually voting for Romney by staying home. Because I didn't vote for Obama. So by not voting for Obama, I voted for Romney. Because you say that if I stay home and don't vote for Romney, I voted for Obama. Now can anybody understand what I just said? I hope you can. But I'm telling you, that's the logic that they use. And I'm not going to vote, I'm not going to do it. Go ahead, vote, do what you want, I'm not telling you what to do, I don't care what you do. I'm telling you, I'm not doing it. I'm not promoting any candidate. I'm not endorsing any candidate, because you know what, I don't believe in any of this garbage that our government's doing. And they're all promoting it. All of them. You say, I'm going to vote for this other, you know, libertarian guy. Yeah, he's pro-abortion, you know, and I'm not endorsing any candidate because I'm not endorsing any of them. They're all bad. And I'm here to tell you something, you know, we need to be careful that we don't get sucked into the world's mentality cheering and cheerleading something that doesn't even matter. And we ought to be cheerleading the work of God, and focusing on what really matters. The Spirit of God and the preaching of God's Word. Let's get off all this political stuff. You know, I mean, it has a place, but you know what, it's not a make or break. This November is not some do or die. That's what they said last time, do you remember? And the time before that, and the time before that, and the time before that, and the time before that. And all the while we just go down the toilet bowl because of the lack of this book. The morning sermon will fix the problem, reading the Bible. Let's bow our heads now.