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

Man, Jeremiah chapter 47, we're in this phase in the book of Jeremiah where each chapter is a judgment upon a particular geography. Last week, we saw the judgment against the Gentiles and against the land of Egypt. This week in chapter 47, we have the judgment against the Philistines and then the next few chapters will be against Moab, Ammon, Babylon itself. And then finally in chapter 52, we'll end on the land of Judah, which is what the whole book had been about up through chapter 44. So in verse number 1 of chapter 47, the Bible reads, the word of the Lord that came to Jeremiah the prophet against the Philistines before that, Pharaoh, Smote, Geza, thus saith the Lord, behold, waters rise up out of the north and shall be an overflowing flood and shall overflow the land and all that is therein, the city and then that dwell therein then the men shall cry and all the inhabitants of the land shall howl. Now this great flood that's coming, this overflowing flood that's going to overflow the land from the north, this is not a flood of water but the Bible often uses the word flood as a metaphor for a great army that's going to come pouring in. These are troops that are coming from the north. And when we hear about destruction coming from the north, we're talking about the Babylonians that are going to approach from the north. Now I'm not sure how good of a visualization you have of the map of that area in your mind but along the Mediterranean Sea there or what the map in the back of your Bible might call the Great Sea, the land of Israel is located right on the coast there and then on the southwest part of Israel, there is the land of the Philistines and it's what's known today as the Gaza Strip, right? That part that's right along the water there. Now in the Bible that's the land of the Philistines, there are five lords of the Philistines that remained after the children of Israel came into the promised land and they took over because they didn't have enough faith, because they didn't fully trust in the Lord and fully obey the Lord, a lot of the nations that they were supposed to drive out ended up remaining. And the Philistines were one of those nations that remained to wit five lords of the Philistines that remained. Gaza was one of them, Ekron, Ashdod, Ashkelon, and Gath. Those are the five main cities of the Philistines and they each had a lord, the five lords of the Philistines. You'll read about this a lot in the Bible. And the Philistines are one of the enemies that the children of Israel were constantly dealing with. When you're reading through books like 1 and 2 Samuel or the book of Judges, they're constantly dealing with the Philistines. Samson dealt with the Philistines. It just mentions scores and scores of times, this enemy that was a thorn in the side of the children of Israel. But to understand the geography, Israel is basically between Babylon and Egypt, okay? Because Egypt is down in the northeast part of Africa, right? And then Babylon is over by the rivers of Tigris and Euphrates in what's known as Mesopotamia. So Israel is kind of right between the two and the land of the Philistines is right next to Israel. It's in what should have been the promised land but they didn't inherit all of it. So part of that is for the Philistines on the coast, okay? So the Bible said in verse number 1, the word of the Lord that came to Jeremiah the prophet against the Philistines before that Pharaoh smote Gaza. So this is Pharaoh coming from Egypt to attack Gaza, one of the great cities of the Philistines. Now, not only that though, he's warning them about an army that's coming from the north which is not the army of Pharaoh because Pharaoh would be coming from the south. So this army that's coming from the north is the Babylonians. So the Philistines are going to get it from both sides basically. They're going to be assaulted by Pharaoh and they're going to be assaulted by the King of Babylon. And of course, we know that in this great conflict between Pharaoh and the King of Babylon that we've read about over the last few chapters, Babylon is going to be victorious and defeat Egypt. That's what God has prophesied in this over and over again. So it says in verse number 2, thus sayeth the Lord, behold, waters rise up out of the north and shall be an overflowing flood and shall overflow the land and all that is therein, the city and then that dwell therein. Then the men shall cry and all the inhabitants of the land shall howl at the noise of the stamping of the hoofs of his strong horses, at the rushing of his chariots. So notice the word of your rushing, like waters rush, but it's actually the rushing of the chariots and at the rumbling of his wheels. The father shall not look back to their children for feebleness of hands. So the Bible is saying here that they're going to be so scared. They're going to be so terrified. They're going to be horrified and they're going to cry. They're going to howl, just, you know, whatever howling you can imagine. And a lot of these people I'm sure had talked pretty tough in the past and they probably even been pretty blasphemous toward the Lord because the Philistines were not a godly people. They worshiped a lot of false gods and they're constantly found in the Bible blaspheming the God of the Bible. But when terror takes hold of people, they're not so tough anymore. One of my favorite examples of this is in Daniel chapter five when Belshazzar is partying and he gets drunk and he decides to drink out of the drinking vessels of the house of God. I mean, just to rub it in how little respect he has for God, just to be as blasphemous as he can possibly be. He wants to get drunk and party with the vessels from the house of God. And when he begins to do so, of course, fingers from a man's hand are sent to write upon the wall. And when he sees those fingers, no arm, no body, no hand, just fingers of a man's hand writing on the wall, he becomes so terrified that the Bible says that his knees literally smite one another. He's shaking, he's trembling and scared. And no matter how tough people talk, no matter how blasphemous or arrogant the atheists of this world are or the other false teachers and false religions of this world are, the Bible tells us that one day every knee shall bow and every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is Lord to the glory of God the Father. And sometimes God has to use an event like this terrible warfare that's being prophesied in Jeremiah 47 to bring people to their knees because people get arrogant and they become pompous. But when God sends this kind of warfare, these people are howling, they're wailing, they're crying out. And I wonder if they would be more receptive to the gospel before this happened or after it happened. They're probably a lot more likely to listen to Jeremiah's preaching or any other man of God's preaching after this happens than before it happens because they're in terror. They're not so tough anymore. God sometimes has to bring these type of events to humble people, to bring them to their knees, to break them down and put them in a position where they're ready to listen, where they're ready to hear what the Lord says to them. So it talks about at the end of verse three, the father shall not look back for their children for feebleness of hands. They're going to be so weak. Their hands are going to be so weak to defend themselves or to do anything to stop it that they're not even going to go back to make sure their children are okay or to try to get their children. They're just going to run away screaming and scared and just try to save their own life and not even go back for the kids. That's how terrified. That's how horrified they're going to be. It says in verse four, because of the day that cometh to spoil all the Philistines and to cut off from Tyrus and Zidon, every helper that remaineth. For the Lord will spoil the Philistines, the remnant of the country of Capthor. Now, Tyre and Zidon is a different geography, but it's in a similar area. So again, try to get a mental map here. You've got that coast of the Mediterranean Sea where Israel is. On the southwest side, you have the Philistines or what we would know today as the Gaza Strip. Well then on the northwest, on that same coast, instead of being just south of Israel, just north of Israel, you have the city states of Tyre and Zidon. They were also heathen countries that worshiped false gods. If you remember Ahab's wife Jezebel was from Zidon. Her father was the king of Zidon and that's what actually got the children of Israel worshiping Baal. That came out of Zidon, the Baal worship that was brought in by Jezebel and Ahab. So he's also bringing judgment upon them. So he's basically preaching against this whole coastal area, this west coast area along the Mediterranean Sea. He said in verse five, baldness is come upon Gaza. Ashkelon is cut off with the remnant of their valley. How long wilt thou cut thyself? Now remember, Gaza and Ashkelon are two of the cities of Philistines, but he says baldness has come upon them. What does that mean? Baldness has come upon them. Well, the way that people would often mourn in the Bible is that they would shave their heads and rend their clothes. In fact, in Job chapter two, the Bible records Job rending his garment and shaving his head completely bald as a sign of... Are some of you in mourning today? No, I'm just kidding. But anyway, it's a sign of mourning. And he says, baldness has come upon Gaza. And then at the end of the verse, he says, how long wilt thou cut thyself? Now this is another way that people would mourn in the Bible by cutting themselves, except this is a way that's wicked in the sight of the Lord. The Bible says in Leviticus chapter 19 that thou shalt not make any cuttings in thy flesh for the dead, to mourn those who died when you're sad or sorrowful about people who've passed away. Thou shalt not make any cuttings in thy flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon thy body, which would be a tattoo. So God doesn't want us to abuse our bodies. He doesn't want us to disfigure or maim ourselves. He doesn't want us to cut ourselves or to print marks upon our body. But cutting yourself goes deeper than that because it's actually associated with being demon-possessed or satanic worship as well. If we go back to the story of Elijah, where he faces off with the prophets of Baal, Bel, Belial, Beelzebub, right, Baal, the prophets of the devil, the prophets of Satan, when it talks about Baal there, when he faces off with the prophets of Baal on Mount Carmel, they cut themselves until blood gushes out while they're calling upon their false god and their god does not answer them. And Elijah says unto them, hey, maybe your god's asleep. Maybe you need to wake him up. You know, what's funny about that is that, you know, in studying Hinduism and all the Hindu gods and things, they actually wake their god up every single day. They do. They have this little thing in their house, this little altar in their home where they worship idols, and it's called the puja when they do their little worship ceremony in their own home. And they take out a little bell, and they ring this little bell in order to wake up God. And when they go to their Hindu temple for corporate worship, what do they do? They ring a bell to try to get God to, they gotta wake up their god. I mean, there's nothing new under the sun, is there? And, you know, I always thought that maybe Elijah was just kind of saying that just to make fun of them. But, you know, he might have actually been speaking intelligently when he said that because he knew that that's probably something that they had done. They probably did frequently wake up their god. And he said, hey, you're not ringing the bell loud enough. You know, you're not yelling loud enough. You gotta wake him up. Wake up your god. And so to try to get their god's attention, one of the things they did was to cut themselves. And we can find this all throughout the Bible. Other false prophets mentioned in the book of Zechariah cutting themselves. Other people in mourning throughout the Bible, cutting themselves in mourning, just like this example right here. Then in the New Testament, we have the vivid example of the maniac of Gadara, the man who's wild and living in the mountains and living in the tombs. And it says he's cutting himself with stones. And he's possessed of a legion of demons. And he's cutting himself with stones. So when we see the phenomenon today of young people cutting themselves, people of all ages cutting themselves. But you see this a lot in the high schools, especially amongst the Gothic chicks, where they just have cut up their arms. And they have all these scars and places where they cut themselves. There are songs about it. And it's demonic. It's evil. They're listening to demonic music. And they have this demonic practice of cutting themselves. I remember one time I went to a church. And the pastor, he preached about the phenomenon of young people cutting themselves. And he talked about in the Christian school, there were people cutting themselves. And in the high school, they're cutting themselves. And he preached for like an hour about these type of what he called anxiety attacks and personality disorders. He had all this psycho babble to talk about. But what's interesting is he never turned to one scripture. Even though there are so many scriptures, I could think of about eight or 10 scriptures that you could turn to on that subject. But he never turned to any of those verses. He never turned to any of those scriptures. It was all just man's thinking and man's wisdom, instead of going to the word of God for what the Bible actually said. A lot of people don't want to face the fact. But the Bible teaches that these things are real. There really are demons in this world. There really are people who worship Satan. There really are modern day prophets of Baal. And there's nothing new under the sun. This still goes on. So that's what he's referring to there in verse number five, when he says, How long wilt thou cut thyself? In verse number six, it says, O thou sword of the Lord, how long will it be ere thou be quiet? Put up thyself into thy scabbard. Rest and be quiet. How can it be quiet, seeing the Lord hath given it a charge against Ashkelon and against the seashore? There at the appointed it. Now, this is Jeremiah in verse six, having compassion for these people. And just as a human being, he's seeing all the carnage that's being shown unto him in the word of the Lord. All the warfare and all the people that are going to be hurt and killed. And obviously, he feels bad about it. It hurts him to think about all the human suffering. And so he cries out to the Lord, O thou sword of the Lord, how long will it be ere thou be quiet, saying, when is all of this going to end? When is God's wrath going to end? When is God's judgment going to end? Put up thyself into thy scabbard. Rest and be still. But the answer is, how can it be quiet, saying, the Lord hath given it a charge against Ashkelon and against the seashore? There hath he appointed it. So even sometimes we don't understand why God comes down so harshly on nations or why God comes down so harshly on people or on sin. And we have compassion, and we feel bad about it. But we have to understand that God is holy, and God is righteous, and whatever he decides to do is right. And God had been very patient with these people, and he had preached to them and preached to them and warned them and warned them, and they didn't listen. And at this point, whatever happens to them is their own fault. And as much as we feel bad for them, and we should feel bad for them, there's nothing wrong with feeling bad for them, but we need to understand that people made their own bed, and sometimes they have to lay in it. Go back, if you would, to Jeremiah 25, because in Jeremiah 25, we see this judgment being prophesied early on, and these people are given a chance to make it right. They're given a chance to repent. They're given a chance to get things right with the Lord. The Philistines are even specifically mentioned. Even though it's a part of the book of Jeremiah that's specifically dealing with the land of Judah, God does send Jeremiah to go preach to other nations. Look at verse number 15 of chapter 25 in Jeremiah. For thus saith the Lord God of Israel unto me, take the wine cup of this fury at my hand, and cause all the nations to whom I send thee to drink it. And they shall drink and be moved and be mad because of the sword that I will send among them. Then took I the cup at the Lord's hand, and made all the nations to drink unto whom the Lord had sent me, to wit Jerusalem and the cities of Judah, and the kings thereof, and the princes thereof, to make them a desolation, an astonishment, an hissing, and a curse as it is at this day. Pharaoh, king of Egypt, and his servants, and his princes, and all his people, and all the mingled people, and all the kings of the land of Uz, and all the kings of the land of the Philistines. Ashkelon, and Aza, that's actually Geza there without the G, another name for it. Ashkelon, and Aza, and Ekron, and the remnant of Ashdod, Edom, and Moab, and the children of Ammon, and all the kings of Tyre, and all the kings of Zidane, and the kings of the isles that are beyond the sea. So what we see here is a listing of a lot of the same people that he's preaching against in chapters 46, 47, 48, and 49 of the book of Jeremiah. And God had sent Jeremiah to them previously, warning them about God's anger, about God's wrath, about the punishment that was coming. Now what's interesting about this chapter is that it shows Jeremiah not only just preaching in Judah but also preaching to the surrounding nations and then going to very distant places because it says in verse 23, Dedan, and Timah, and Buz, and all that are in the utmost corners. The utmost corners is similar to the wording when God tells us to take the gospel onto the uttermost part of the earth, where he said, you shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem, and in Judea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth. So he says the utmost corners, and all the kings of Arabia, and all the kings of the mingled people that dwell in the desert, and all the kings of Zimra, and all the kings of Elam, and all the kings of the Medes, and all the kings of the north, far and near, one with another, and all the kingdoms of the world, which are upon the face of the earth, and the king of Shishak shall drink after them. So God's intent was that Jeremiah would preach the word of God in every country in the whole world, to the whole world. Now a lot of people have this mistaken understanding that in the Old Testament, God only cared about Israel, and it's only in the New Testament that he somehow cares about the rest of mankind. But God has always loved all of mankind, and he has always wanted all of mankind to be saved, and to hear his word, and to have a chance to respond to the word of God, and call upon the name of the Lord. Because when Jesus preached, before he died on the cross, and was buried and rose again, when Jesus preached, and the Old Covenant was still in force, he preaches about Old Testament examples over and over again, to try to show the hard neck Jews that he also loved the Gentiles, and that he wanted to be a light to the Gentiles, and he brings out Old Testament examples, where he talks about how there were a lot of widows in the days of Alyssius the prophet, or Elisha the prophet, and he said, but he was only sent to the one that was of Zarephath, which is a place of Zayden, a foreign country. And he talks about all the lepers in the Old Testament that were not healed, but Nahum in the Syrian, a foreigner who believed on the Lord, was healed. And he used that to show them that there would be weeping and gnashing of teeth when they saw Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven, sitting down with people that had come from all nations, people coming from the east and west. But he said, but the children of the kingdom, meaning the kingdom of Israel, shall be cast out into outer darkness. There shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. So even in the Old Testament, God is constantly reaching out to people of all nations and all kindreds. We already saw earlier in the book of Jeremiah, a chapter that was directed toward an Ethiopian man. So it's not just in the New Testament that God cared about an Ethiopian. In Acts chapter eight, he cared about an Ethiopian back in the book of Jeremiah. God's nature has always been one where he's the God of the whole earth. He's the God of all nations, the God of all people. God so loved the world, not just one nation, not just one group of people. And so we see here that God is sending this message to the world because he cares about them. Now, it might not seem that way on the surface when you look at the message that he sent to preach. It says in verse 27, therefore, thou shalt say unto them, thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel, drink ye and be drunken and spew. And fall and rise no more because of the sword which I will send among you. That doesn't sound like a very loving message, does it? Be drunken and spew, fall, rise no more. But you know, I preached a sermon one time called Be Drunken and Spew that was based on this passage and a lot of other passages. But you know why I preached that sermon? Was it because I hated or because I loved? You see, love will tell you the truth and warn you about the destruction that's coming. If God didn't care about these people, he would just send the destruction with no warning. What's to stop him from just sending the destruction, sending the forces of Nebuchadnezzar, sending all the wrath and punishment without warning them? The point that he's even warning them shows that he cares about them. But today, when you try to warn people, they accuse you of being unloving or being hateful when you tell them the truth. You know, you preach against false religion, you preach against the Hindus or the Buddhists or anybody else, and what do they say? Oh, you must hate Indian people because you preach so much about the Hindus. Look, you know what I would do if I hated Indian people? I'd never talk about Hinduism. I'd never mention it, never bring it up, right? Just let them be doomed, let them be damned. But no, because we love people. We wanna warn them and preach to them not what they want to hear, not what sounds good to them, but what they need to hear because we love them. And so we see here that this message is being sent as a warning, and it's being preached in love. And we know Jeremiah loved these people because he's begging God to be merciful. He's begging God to put the sword of the Lord back in its scabbard, but yet he's preaching a hard sermon. Why? Because hard preaching is not done out of spite or hatred or anger. Hard preaching is done out of love because it's the preaching that actually gets people to turn to the Lord. It actually works. I don't care what anybody says, hard preaching works. The soft preaching, the tiptoeing through the tulips kind of preaching, it doesn't get the job done. It doesn't reach people. It's the fear of the Lord that makes people depart from evil. And so we need to preach the whole counsel of God, and we need to preach the way that the men in the Bible preach, the way Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, John the Baptist, Jesus, Peter, John, the way they preach read those sermons in the book of Acts where Peter and John are preaching. Read those sermons where the apostle Paul's preaching in the book of Acts, they're preaching hard. And they're not pulling any punches. I mean, look at the way Peter preaches in Acts chapter two and in chapter three, four, five, I mean, they are preaching hard and saying that you have been the murderers and betrayers and the son of God. And look, they're cut to the heart and they respond and thousands of people get saved. It worked. They didn't just get up and just preach a soft soap sermon and get those kinds of results. Which of the prophets did? Show me the prophet in the Bible that was the prophet of peace, saying peace, peace, when there is no peace, you won't find it. The Bible says here in verse 28, and it shall be, if they refuse to take the cup at thine hand to drink, then thou shalt, thou shall say unto them, thus saith the Lord of hosts, ye shall certainly drink. For lo, I begin to bring evil on the city, which is called by my name. And should ye be utterly unpunished? You shall not be unpunished. For I will call for a sword upon all the inhabitants of the earth, saith the Lord of hosts. Now, why is it that God's so mad? What is it that he's punishing them for? Why is God's wrath coming upon them? Well, it says in verse 14, for many nations and great kings shall serve themselves of them also. And I will recompense them according to their deeds and according to the works of their own hands. So God's judgment is coming upon them because of the works of their hands, because of the deeds that they've done. This is why God judges a nation. Now, when it comes to our personal salvation, thankfully, our personal salvation is not based on our deeds. It's not based on our works. The Bible says, for by grace are you saved through faith and then not of yourselves, it is the gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast. So our salvation is not based on our works or our deeds or the works of our hands, but whether or not God blesses us in our life, that is based on our works. That is based on our deeds. And so when God brings punishment on a nation, it has to do with the works of their hands. It has to do with the things that they've done, the sins that they've done. And so for example, and this is a way that I like to explain it. I think this helps to understand it. Let's say that our church is composed of 95% people that are saved, right? Let's say 95% of the people in our church believe on the Lord Jesus Christ as their savior. They've got Jesus in their heart, right? But let's say that our church begins to be a place where sin is acceptable. And I'm talking about not just little sins, I'm talking about major sins. Like we just start having fornication be the norm and getting drunk becomes the norm, right? Just big sins. I mean, and I mean, women are getting pregnant and having abortions. Okay, so imagine that, right? Abortions, which is murder. Let's say fornication is going on, drunkenness is going on. Well, do you think that God is just gonna sit there and say, well, I'll just let that go. I'm just gonna let that happen. Or is God gonna bring a punishment if people are committing major sin? Well, obviously God's gonna bring a punishment. Whom the Lord loveth, he chasteneth and scourges every son whom he receiveth. And wouldn't it be silly to say, well, but we're saved though. So of course God's not gonna punish us. Now you're saved, that means you're going to heaven. But if you're living on this earth in a sinful way, you're gonna get punished on this earth. So just as if my son disobeys my rules, I'm not gonna throw him out of the house. I'm still gonna love him. I'm still gonna feed him. I'm still gonna take care of him, but he's gonna get punished in my house. I'm gonna discipline him. I'm gonna scourge him, but I'm not gonna throw him out of the family. It's the same thing with God. So if we look at our nation, people getting saved is not enough to stop God from judging our nation. Now getting people saved is the only place to start. I mean, getting people saved is important for eternal reasons. Just getting them saved, getting them out of hell, getting them on their way to heaven. And also getting saved is a starting point where a person can then grow more and learn more, get baptized, get in church, learn all the thou shalt and thou shalt nots, clean up their life, serve the Lord and on and on. So when we see the great commission, the great commission is not just to get people saved. It's also to get people baptized. And it's also to teach them to observe all things that Christ commanded. So if we just had a great soul winning movement across America, that's not enough to fix things. We also need a great movement of hard preaching. We also need a great movement of biblical preaching. We also need a lot of teaching and doctrine. We need to make sure that our ministry is well-rounded and that we cover all the bases because it's not enough just to believe on the Lord to escape judgment on this earth. Believing on the Lord is enough to get you to heaven. Thank God. For by grace are we saved through faith. Thank God. But it's not enough to spare you God's punishment and God's wrath because God's punishment on this earth comes because of our deeds, okay? When we go out and live a sinful life, even if we are a child of God, even if we do believe on Jesus Christ and we're saved and secure, when we go out and fornicate, when we go out and drink, when we go out and do drugs, when we go out and steal and do all kinds of sinful things, God will punish us. Our life will not be blessed. God's not gonna bless you when you're living a sinful life. You're gonna reap what you've sown. So if you want God to bless you, if you wanna have a way that's prosperous and filled with good success, you've got to obey the Lord and you've got to do what he tells you to do. Just as if my children want to be blessed and happy in my home, they better obey my commandments or they're gonna be chastened. They're gonna be punished. That's what the Bible is teaching over and over again. It's because of their deeds. What type of deeds were they doing that would bring God's punishment? Well, it's really just the same old things that God's constantly punishing. Even into the future in Revelation chapter nine, we see that list. Number one, they're worshiping idols, right? Gods of gold, gods of silver. And then we see the fornication. We see the murder and we see the theft and we see the greed and covetousness and just basic sinful living. That's what brings God's wrath upon a nation, whether it's the Philistines or whether it's the United States of America. It's the same things. It's stealing, it's murder, it's fornication, it's idolatry, it's adultery. It's all of the things that God tells us not to do in our lives. And so he's recompensing them. And what does it mean to recompense? Halfway through verse 14 there, he said, I will recompense them according to their deeds. Recompense means repay. And that's why God said, vengeance belongeth unto me, say the Lord, I will repay or I will recompense. So what's God doing when he judges the Philistines? He's paying them back. It's payback time. The wages of sin is death. He is bringing the punishment upon them that they have earned through years and years and decades and decades of sinful living, ignoring Jeremiah, ignoring other men of God. It's finally coming upon them. And then Jeremiah says, no, God, stop. But God says, wait a minute, I'm not gonna stop until I'm done. They've had every chance. I've warned them. They must be destroyed. It's a sad story. It's a very negative book of the Bible, Jeremiah, but it didn't have to be that way. The reason that it's such a negative book is because of the stiff necked, hard-hearted people that are refusing to obey the voice of the Lord when times are good. And so God has to bring these bad times into our lives. And sadly, the United States of America right now is not a godly place. People are not turning to the Lord right now. People don't wanna hear hard preaching. You know, we are faithful at this church to go out and knock doors every week. We have 11 different soul-winning times, and we have hundreds of people out every single week knocking doors. And the vast majority of the doors that we knock, the people have zero interest in hearing the word of God. Isn't that the truth? Those who go soul-winning, right? You go soul-winning, and the vast majority of people are not interested. I mean, on Sunday, we had a group of 16 people that went into a little nicer of an area, and those, you know, for three hours they knocked, and no one wanted to hear the gospel in three hours. 16 people. Why? Because they're living in prosperity. Now, if we went to a rougher part of town, we'd find more people who are interested. Still, the majority would not be interested, because even poor people in the United States live better than middle-class people in other parts of the world. So because of our prosperity, a lot of people just don't have any interest in the things of God. And drunkenness abounds, fornication abounds, theft abounds, abortion abounds, sodomy abounds, all the different sins that are so blatant and obvious to our eyes. And people just, they don't wanna hear this kind of preaching today. Now, of course, there are people who do wanna hear it. That's why we got a packed house tonight on Wednesday night. That's why we're always packed. Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night. And our church is continually growing. And God willing, you know, may it continue to grow even more in the future, because there are still some people who wanna hear what Jeremiah chapter 47 has to say. Even though Jeremiah 47 is probably never touched upon or even preached in most churches across America, they're too busy preaching sweetness and light. And I'm all for preaching sweetness and light, but we also need to preach bitterness and dark, because that's what you get when you live a life of sin. You get the bitter dregs of the cup of the wine of God's wrath, which is poured out without mixture with his indignation. And so we need to understand that the world that we live in today, and especially the country that we live in the United States of America, doesn't wanna hear the word of God until something bad happens. And then they're gonna be more receptive at that time. When the economic downturn comes, then they'll come to church. How many people when they're doing well, when they're healthy, when they're strong, when they're making money, they won't darken the door of church. But then as soon as things go wrong in their lives, all of a sudden they're showing up at church, they're seeking the Lord. I mean, I remember when 9-11 happened, right? Everybody's praying and God bless America and for like 48 hours. And then they kind of just went back to disregarding God. But do you remember that? I mean, there was a feeling for a few days there that people were getting right with God. Why? Because they're howling. They're scared. They don't know what's gonna happen. They're wondering when the next buildings are gonna come down. But then once they realize that the attack was over and they're safe, they just kind of went back to disregarding the things of God. Well, you know what that tells me is that God sometimes has to bring bad things just to get people's attention. Why? Because the souls are what matters. And frankly, more souls will go to heaven when things go bad because of the fact that people will be more receptive to the word of God and receptive to the gospel. And it's a shame that it has to be that way. But that's why when we see things happen, like wars and famines and pestilences and just natural disasters, obviously we should feel bad and have compassion and feel sorrow for the people that are affected. But the Bible tells us not to be distressed by these things because of the fact that these things must come to pass. And the reason why they must happen is because of people's sinful lives. God has to bring that judgment. And then he softens people up. And then they're ready to hear the word of God preached. And we need to be faithful to preach when it's easy and when it's hard, when they're receptive and when they're not receptive, whether they hear or whether they forbear, we're to preach. We're to go solely because even when things are hardened, you can still get people saved. We still get people saved every week, even though it's an uphill battle, it still can happen. But we need to be ready and in practice and prepared too, because when bad times come and when sorrows come, sometimes we can see a great multitude of people saved. And so we need to be ready to step in and preach and when souls, when those hard times come, because I believe that they're coming in our lifetime. I'd be surprised if they don't, maybe they won't. I don't know the future. Sometimes God is very patient and long suffering. And sometimes many decades go by before his wrath is poured out. But someday it's coming. And when it comes, when the judgment comes, and I'm not saying necessarily the final judgment of the, I'm not saying exactly the events of the tribulation, although that's coming as well. We don't know when that's coming. But even before that, there could be other minor judgments that come upon a nation or an area. And when those times come, those should be a time of us preaching more, soul winning more and getting as many people saved as we can, not backing off, but pressing forward. And so that kind of explains why there's a lot of suffering in the world. A lot of people don't understand, where's all the suffering in the world coming from? And I've even heard some people say, well, I don't believe in the Bible because there's so much suffering in the world. Yeah, but anybody who says that must have never read the Bible because there's so much suffering in the Bible. I mean, the Bible is such a negative book when you actually read the whole thing and not just the cherry picked portions of it. And when people say, well, how can the Bible be true? Look at all the horrible things. Have you ever read all the horrible things in the Bible? The Bible matches reality, which proves the Bible to be true. I mean, if the Bible were only positive, then I'd say, well, man, that doesn't make any sense. This doesn't look anything like the world that I see around me. But when I read the Bible and then I look around at the world and even the place where we live, I see the words of the Bible being played out every day. I see the blessings of the Bible constantly coming upon those who obey the Lord and the curses of the Bible constantly coming upon those who disregard his word. I mean, the Bible rings true all around us. And it's not all positive because this world has a lot of bad things and a lot of negative things. But we should be thankful we live in one of the nicest places in the whole world. I mean, we have prosperity. We have good health. We have good safety here. We eat good food. And even those who are homeless tonight, hey, at least the weather's good. I mean, we could be in Minnesota or something, right? And so God has given us a lot in this country. Let's not become complacent and think that God owes us a living somehow, but let's seek the Lord in the good times so that he doesn't have to bring bad times into our personal life. It's probably gonna take bad times to wake up America as a nation, but in our personal lives, we need to serve the Lord and be zealous for him even when times are good so that he doesn't have to bring bad times in order to shake us out of our apathy. So if you're a wise person, you'll be one who's serving God when things are good and not just, oh, things are bad. Let me turn to the Lord. Turn to him now. And the more you're prospering, the more you need to be sure and seek him so that you can keep that going, right? You don't wanna blow that deal. You know, and sometimes things are going good in my life and I think to myself like, man, this is too good to be true. Is something about to go wrong? And I think to myself, man, I need to be, I better be reading my Bible and praying and going to church and so on because I don't wanna mess this up. Things are going good. Don't be foolish and just think, oh, things are going good. Forget church, let's go party. Well, that's a recipe for disaster. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for the book of Jeremiah and for the bad example of the Philistines that we read about tonight in Jeremiah chapter 47, Lord. Please help us not to be like unto them, Lord, where we just dwell at ease and think that nothing can go wrong. Disregard you, disregard your word. Lord, help us to be faithful to church, faithful to our Bibles, faithful to your commandments, instant in season, out of season, Lord. Help us to do what's right and reap blessings from you, Lord, and not be constantly on the receiving end of your chastisement because of our disregard for your word. In Jesus' name, we pray, amen.