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

Man, the part of the chapter I want to focus on is beginning there in verse 27. The Bible reads, and it came to pass as he spake these things, a certain woman of the company lifted up her voice and said unto him, blessed is the womb that bear thee and the paps which thou has sucked. But he said, yea rather blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it. And the title of my sermon this morning is Mariolatry, Mariolatry. Now what does this word mean, Mariolatry? Well it's a combination of the words Mary and idolatry. Instead of worshiping an idol, they're worshiping Mary as an idol. Well who are we talking about today? Well of course we're talking about one billion Roman Catholics in this world today that are part of that pagan false religion that masquerades itself as Christianity while having all kinds of pagan and idolatrous teachings and one of their most unbiblical teachings is the fact that they worship the virgin Mary. Now they'll tell you that they are just venerating Mary, but they pray to Mary, they bow down to Mary, they make idols of Mary, they have shrines to Mary, and they believe that Mary is some kind of a mediatrix between themselves and the Lord. But the Bible says there's one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. One mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. Now in this passage that we just looked at, we have the first Roman Catholic in the Bible and this woman cries out, blessed is the womb that bear thee and the paps which thou has sucked, obviously referring to his mother, his physical mother, the womb that bear him, the paps or breasts that he sucked. But he said, and look, just focus in on that first word there for a second, but, but, right, that is something that is showing us the contrast between what this woman said and what Jesus is responding. Jesus isn't saying, well, right, yeah. And also here's some other people who are blessed, you know, she says, blessed is Mary, but he said, yay, rather blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it. Now what does the word rather mean? Rather means more, more so he's saying those who hear the word of God and keep it are more blessed than Mary. So is Mary the most blessed woman who ever walked the face of the earth or ever will walk the face of the earth? Not according to Jesus, because any woman who hears the word of God and keeps it has the potential to be more blessed than Mary. Mary was blessed among women. Well guess what? JL in the book of Judges was blessed above women. So what lots of women are blessed and Mary is not the most blessed woman ever because he rather is blessed they that hear the word of God and do it. That's what the Bible says. And so it's about being a disciple of Christ, not about being the physical womb that gave birth to Christ. Yet the Roman Catholics have this bizarre false doctrine of venerating or worshiping Mary praying to Mary, believing that somehow Mary has power over Jesus when in reality Mary is just a godly woman. She's in heaven. She's a godly woman. Lots of godly women are in heaven. Was she blessed? Absolutely. Other women are blessed. We don't want to make an idol out of Mary or elevate her higher than she ought to be elevated. She's just another wonderful female biblical character that was used by God to perform a function and she's human and she's not sinless. She's not God. She's not someone to worship. And Jesus Christ right here is making it pretty clear how he feels about this praise of Mary. He actually kind of shuts it down and turns it around and says, well no, you know, it's actually this way more so. Now here's what's interesting about this. So this is only in the Gospel of Luke. Why is this only in the Gospel of Luke? Well there are a couple things about this is that the Gospel of Luke also contains Roman Catholics' favorite passages about Mary because the Gospel of Luke also contains the parts where the angel comes to Mary and then she responds and so forth. And so the so-called Magnificat and all that is found in the Gospel of Luke where it says you're highly favored, you're blessed among women. That's found in the Gospel of Luke. So it's nice to have this to balance that out and let people know, hey, don't misinterpret that as the need to venerate and worship Mary. But here's a second reason is that keep your finger in, actually don't keep your finger, but go over to Matthew chapter 12, I can just explain this to you. In Luke 11, leading up to this, we had the story about the unclean spirit having gone out of a man. We just read the whole chapter before the sermon and right before the part where he corrects this proto-Catholic woman who's trying to worship Mary, right before that he talks about the unclean spirit going out of a man and wandering and not finding a home. And then right after he corrects this woman, he talks about the sign of Jonah and how that's the sign that shall be given to this generation. So that's the immediate context before and after this interaction with the woman. We've got the unclean spirit going out of a man and then we've got the sign of the prophet Jonah. Well here's what's interesting. In Matthew chapter 12, you'll notice that in verses 38 through 42, we have the sign of the prophet Jonah, same context. And then in verses 43 through 45 of Matthew 12, we have the passage about the unclean spirit having gone out of a man, do you see that? So we see that this is a parallel passage, same context, same things surrounding it and we have another totally different situation, but yet it makes the same point. So look at your Bible there in verse 46, while he yet talked to the people, behold his mother, that's Jesus' mother, and his brother has stood without desiring to speak with him. Now in verse 46, notice the word yet. Yet means still, right? He's still talking to the people, meaning he's not done. He's yet talking. He's still talking to them. While he yet talked to the people, they basically want to interrupt him. They are desiring to speak with him. Then one said unto him, verse 47, behold thy mother and thy brethren stand without desiring to speak with you. So he's preaching to a crowd. He's speaking to a crowd and someone stops him and says, wait a minute, your mother and your brethren are outside. They want to talk to you. So I guess he's supposed to drop everything, pause the sermon, pause the teaching and go running out to his mother and brethren. But what does he answer? And again, notice that wonderful conjunction at the beginning of verse 48, but, okay, but he answered and said unto him that told him, who is my mother and who are my brethren? And he stretched forth his hand toward his disciples and said, behold my mother and my brethren. He said, look, the men and the women that are actually here in this congregation present listening to me preach, that's my mother and that's my brethren. And then he says in verse 30 or verse 50 for whosoever shall do the will of my father, which is in heaven, the same as my brother and sister and mother. I mean a random woman in the congregation, he says, well, I'll consider her my mother if she's doing the will of the father, which is in heaven. Now does anything that we're looking at here seem to indicate that Christ has elevated Mary on this pedestal where we should have shrines to Mary, burn incense to Mary, make images of Mary, pray to Mary. Mary is somehow going to exert power over Jesus. That's absurd in light of these scriptures because even when there's a hint of that, Jesus nips it in the bud. In Matthew chapter 12, he nips it in the bud. Who's my mother? Mary who? But would that fly today in the Roman Catholic, I always said the mother whore church, but the Roman Catholic church, would that fly? That great whore, mother of abominations, the Roman Catholic church? No. Would that fly today? This thing of just, well, who is Jesus' mother? Whoever does the will of God, the same as his mother and sister and brother. I mean that'd be considered blasphemy today in the Roman Catholic church, but it's the word of Jesus. It's what he said. And then somebody cries out and tries to praise Mary in the Gospel of Luke and he says, yea rather blessed are they that hear the word of God and keep it. So here's what's interesting. We have the passage in Matthew chapter 12. We have the same passage in Mark 3. In Mark chapter 3, same thing. Your mother and brethren are standing outside waiting to talk to you. Who is my mother? Who are my brethren? Same thing in Mark 3. So we have Matthew 12, we have Mark 3, and then in Luke 11, we have the story that we started with. So what you'll notice here is that basically this passage in Luke 11, 27 and 28 is standing in for the incident about saying, well, who is my mother? Who are my brethren? It's performing the same function in the same parallel passage. So it's basically Luke, instead of including the anecdote about your mother and brethren are waiting outside, he instead includes this other anecdote that makes the same point in the same passage surrounded by the same context. Why? Because that's clearly the right point that's being made. Because somebody could say like, well you're misinterpreting what happened there with that woman. But hold on a second. It's standing in for the same point that's made in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and it's all showing the same thing in the same context. It's impossible to misunderstand. What about the Gospel of John? Well go to John chapter 2. John chapter 2, of course John is the most dramatically different of the four Gospels, right? Matthew, Mark, and Luke are collectively known as the synoptic Gospels and those three Gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke are usually in lockstep on a lot of things. They all have their own unique material and their own unique perspectives. But those three Gospels are very related to one another, very much connected to one another. It's possible that Mark's Gospel was written first and then Matthew is using Mark as a source, adding a lot of other material. Luke is using Mark as a source, adding different material, and so forth because of the fact that we know that although the Bible is divinely inspired and it's the perfect Word of God, it's also written by human authors. And so these human authors, they're inspired by God. They spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost. Ultimately it is the Holy Ghost speaking to us through Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, but there's also human authorship. There's obviously connection in the human authorship of Matthew, Mark, and Luke, whatever that connection is. But the Gospel of John stands apart and is very different from the other three, but yet of course, same truth, same salvation, same Gospel, just from a very different perspective. Even in the Gospel of John, we don't have this passage that we see in the other three Gospels, that particular event, that particular sermon, and those ideas, but what we have instead is another passage that's unique to the Gospel of John that again makes the same point or a similar point. So that all four Gospels bear witness to the fact that Jesus is not somehow at the beck and call of Mary and that there's no reason to venerate or worship Mary and that Jesus Christ did not go around promoting Mary, exalting Mary, lifting up Mary as an object of worship. We saw that he was shutting that down in Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Now look at John chapter two, verse one, and the third day there was a marriage in Cana of Galilee and the mother of Jesus was there and both Jesus was called and his disciples to the marriage. Now when they wanted wine, and this word want here is more like our word, they were lacking wine, they're running out of wine, right? Like the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want, it means like I'm not gonna lack something that I need. When they wanted wine, the mother of Jesus saith unto him, they have no wine. So Jesus' mother comes to him and says they have no wine. Now, you know, that's a pretty reasonable thing to say to Jesus, just to bring this problem to his attention. Jesus saith unto her, woman! Now I'm not saying that he said it in that voice, obviously I'm just kidding. I'm joking. But this is not necessarily the most venerating worshipful word that he could use to speak to mom at this point. And I believe that everything is in the Bible as it should be for a reason and I I think that Jesus Christ is saying this because he wants to make it clear who the boss is, who's in charge in this situation. Now look, I believe that Jesus was the ideal son. I believe that he honored his mother to a T because he followed the law of God perfectly. He was tempted in all points like as we are and yet without sin, and if Jesus had dishonored his mother, then that would have been a sin because the Bible commands us to honor our father and mother. And of course, Jesus said of his father, which was in heaven, I do always those things which please him. And of course, Jesus honored his physical mother, his earthly mother. And make no mistake about it, just to mention another heresy that's out there. You know, Jesus Christ is physically the son of Mary. Don't make any mistake about that. He's a biological, actual, real son of Mary because he's the son of man. He was made of a woman. He's born of Mary. But that doesn't make her God any more than it makes any of his other ancestors God. You know, we don't want to pray to his grandma either. You know, that's his physical grabs his actual physical grandma. I don't know. Maybe we can dig up like the kneecap of his grandma, the patella. And maybe we can bow down to it, kiss it, worship it. Maybe the Pope can wear it around his neck with a hole drilled in the middle of, you know, the little chicken nugget bone of Jesus's great grandma. It doesn't make any sense, does it? There's just human beings, okay? But here's the thing, Jesus is saying to her here, woman, and he addresses other females in the Bible as woman, you know, I'm not saying it's disrespectful, but it's not a super venerating term either. It's kind of just a neutral term, just woman. Not even mommy. Jesus says unto her, woman, whatever you say, woman, whatever you say, mother, your wish is my command. I mean, how can I tell you no? No he says, woman, what have I to do with thee? What am I going to do with, you know, now this is again, not necessarily a friendly or flattering response, okay? And look, you'd kind of have to be blind not to see what's going on in this passage, wouldn't you? When he says, woman, what have I to do with thee, mine hour is not yet come. Saying, look, woman, what are we doing here? And then look, look at how she is the one who then backs off and says, his mother says unto the servants, whatsoever he sayeth unto you, do it. So who's the boss here? Who's in charge? It's not Jesus taking orders from his mom. Now he ends up doing what she would like him to do in the end, but he does it of his own volition and he does it as a reward for the fact that she gets put in her proper place and says, well, look, okay, you know what? It's not my place, but whatever he says to you, just obey Jesus. Just do what Jesus says. And I guarantee you that Mary is sitting up in heaven right now and she would still tell you the same thing. If she could talk to Catholics right now, you know what she would say to Catholics right now? She would say, whatever Jesus says to you, do it. That's what Mary would say. That's the message that Mary has for all Catholics today. Whatever Jesus says, do it. If Jesus says to call no man father, then don't call any man father. If Jesus says that believing on him is how you achieve something, then that's what you need to do. Keep on the Lord Jesus Christ and thou shalt be saved. And so this story serves a similar function of Mary being exalted a little too highly and then Jesus moderating that and putting her in her proper place. Again, a godly woman, a righteous woman, but not divine, not God, not sinless, not the object of our worship. So there's an Elvis Presley song called Miracle of the Rosary. Who's ever heard of this song by Elvis Presley? Miracle of the Rosary. All right, two people. Apparently it wasn't up there with, you know, the Jailhouse Rock or whatever. But anyway, Miracle of the Rosary is an Elvis song. It's written by someone else, but this is performed by Elvis. It's on his albums and whatever. Let me read for you the lyrics from the Elvis Presley song, Miracle of the Rosary. Oh, blessed mother, we pray to thee, thanks for the miracle of your rosary. Only you can hold back your holy son's hand long enough for the whole world to understand. So basically, here's what's going on. Miriam, can you come up and be my volunteer because your name is Mary, basically. Come on up here. In the original language, Miriam and Mary are the same name. So all right, come on up here, Mary, hail Mary, full of grace, swing those beads all over the place. Come on up here. So basically, this is the picture that, and you say, well, that's just an Elvis Presley song. Yeah, but Catholics love it. They eat it up with fork and spoon because this is how Catholics view Mary, okay? Basically, like Jesus is just ready to just pour out his wrath on everybody. He's ready just to destroy everybody. Hold me back, come on, hold me, no, let me at him. And she's like, son, calm, all right, have a seat. Son, calm down. No, I'm going to destroy them all. Folks, there is nothing like that in the Bible. That is garbage. To think that somehow, I mean, listen to what the song is saying, only you can hold back your holy son's hand. So Jesus is trying to do something and Mary's holding him back, holding back, and only she can hold him back. So I guess God, the Father can't hold him back. The Holy Spirit can't hold him back. Moses and everybody else up in heaven trying to tell him to chill out. But guess what? He doesn't need to chill out. He is the perfect, sinless Son of God who has all wisdom, all knowledge, all power. He doesn't need someone holding back his hand. And certainly not Mary. Only you can hold back your holy son's hand long enough for the whole world to understand. So Mary's just trying to buy us a little more time up in heaven by holding back Jesus' hand. It's absurd. And then the song goes on to say, Hail Mary, full of grace. The Lord is with thee. Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb, Jesus. Oh Holy Mary, dear Mother of God, please pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death, and give thanks once again for the miracle of your rosary. Now you want to talk about selling your soul for rock and roll? It's Elvis Presley. Elvis Presley wasn't even Catholic. But because of filthy lucre for money or fame or whatever he's trying to accomplish, he's singing this trash, this garbage, this theologically bankrupt song. Why? Just because he sold his soul for rock and roll. I mean think about this. He's not even Catholic. Why? Is he singing this song about the rosary and the Hail Mary and all this garbage? Because people in the music industry, in the Hollywood industry, they're being controlled by other people. And they have to do what these other people want in order to succeed if they don't play ball, if they don't cooperate with what other people are telling them to do. So there's obviously some Catholic executive somewhere or somebody in the record company and he's Catholic and basically Elvis is just willing to do whatever in order to just be able to keep recording or selling albums or getting promoted or whatever. But you want to talk about garbage. This doesn't make any sense. But it accurately reflects Catholic doctrine. That's why Catholics love it so much. Now this term Mother of God is found in the song because he's quoting the Hail Mary that Catholics chant and when they chant this vain, oh by the way, what did Mary say about Jesus? Whatever he says, do you do it? Well Jesus said, when you pray, use not vain repetitions as the heathen do for they think that they shall be heard for their much speaking. And so vain repetitions are something that the heathen use. When we pray, we're supposed to actually pray our own prayer and not just repeat something over and over again. We say it one time and we don't need to say it over and over again. But one of the things that they chant is the Hail Mary, which includes this Oh Holy Mary, Dear Mother of God. Now let's talk about this term Mother of God. Flip over if you went to Matthew chapter 22. Matthew chapter 22, because here's the thing, the term Mother of God is not found in scripture. So right there, that should tell us this is not a term that we should be using because if there's all this scripture giving all these names for God and there's all these scriptures about Mary and the Bible didn't confer on her this title Mother of God, why would we confer that? This seems like offering a strange fire before the Lord that the Lord commanded not like Nadab and Abihu in Leviticus 10 offering strange fire that the Lord commanded not. This offering of praise to Mary under the title Mother of God is not taught in scripture and in fact it is unscriptural to call her that. Now you say well technically it's correct because you know Jesus is God and Mary's the mother of Jesus, so ergo Mary's the mother of God. Now here's the thing, it is true that Mary's the mother of Jesus, amen, and it is true that Jesus is God. But here's the thing, just because those things are true doesn't mean that we should be using this title and I'm going to show you scripture to back up my point. But here's the thing, didn't Jesus say everyone who does the will of God the same as my mother and sister and brother? Okay so then basically I could just, every godly woman in this church, I could just start calling them Mother of God. Because technically, I mean Jesus said they're his mother and Jesus is God so therefore why don't I just invent this new term and instead of saying hello sister so-and-so, hello Mrs. so-and-so, it's just going to be like hello Mother of God, hey there Mother of God. Now you'd say that's crazy but by the same logic Catholics are using I could justify and say well Jesus is God, Jesus said they're his mother. Folks that doesn't make that term any less stupid and blasphemous, okay? Because of the fact, and let's look at it together, let's see what the Bible says. Why don't we go to the Word of God and test this term in light of scripture. Look at Matthew 22 verse 41, while the Pharisees were gathered together Jesus asked them saying, what think ye of Christ, whose son is he? They say unto him, the son of David. They said, you know, Christ is the son of David. Now let me ask you something, is Jesus the son of David? Yeah, because guess what? If we were to go to Matthew 1, 1, it says the beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. So Matthew chapter 1 verse 1 starts out by telling us Jesus is the son of David, okay? So it's accurate. But Jesus asked them, so what do you think of Christ, whose son is he? They say, son of David. He sayeth unto them, are they technically wrong? Of course not. They're right in line with what Matthew 1, 1 said. But Jesus says unto them, how then does David in spirit call him Lord, saying the Lord said unto my Lord, sit thou on my right hand till I make thine enemies thy footstool. If David then call him Lord, how is he his son? And no man was able to answer him a word, neither durst any man from that day forth ask him any more questions. We have the same thing in Mark chapter 12 verse 35. You don't have to turn there, but Jesus said while he taught in the temple, how say the scribes that Christ is the son of David? For David himself said by the Holy Ghost, the Lord said to my Lord, sit thou on my right hand till I make thine enemies thy footstool. David therefore himself calleth him Lord, and whence is he then his son? And the common people heard him gladly. Now what is Jesus saying here? Is Jesus saying, I'm not the son of David? No. He's asking this thought provoking question, well, if David calls him Lord, then how is he David's son? Here's the point that he's making. He's saying, look, Jesus Christ is greater than David. Jesus Christ existed before David existed. Jesus Christ is God, and so therefore he's not in that sense the son of David, right? Physically earthly, yeah, he came into this existence at a point in time, but before Abraham was, he said, I am. Jesus said before Abraham was, I am. Jesus Christ has no beginning and no ending, and that's the point that he's making here when he says, well, how can he be the son of David if David calls him Lord? Okay, so you could turn around and apply the same thing to Mary because just as much as Mary physically begat Jesus, well, so did David because Mary is physically descended from David and so therefore you could say that David's the father of God. Now that's bizarre, isn't it? Just as weird as it would be for me to just calling, start calling church ladies mother of God, it would also be strange for me to say, well, Abraham's the father of God, David's the father of God, but why would that be any different than calling Mary the mother of God? Mary physically brought that body into this world. Well, so did David, so did Abraham. They contributed to that gene pool as well. They're part of that physical line too. Why don't we call them the father? Why don't we, why don't we have a grandfather of God, grandma of God, great, great grandfather of God, uncle, how about uncle of God, aunt of God, cousin of God? Because it doesn't make any sense because it's foolish because it's a twisting of what the Bible actually teaches and it's just an attempt to try to put Mary on a pedestal where she doesn't belong. That's all that is. So yeah, you could say like, oh, you're saying Jesus isn't God? No, Jesus is God and Mary's the mother of Jesus, but saying Mary's the mother of God is a stupid statement and here's the proof. It's not in the Bible and here's the other proof. Jesus said, well, if David calls Christ Lord, how is he the son of David? Don't try to make him out to be subservient to David in any way. Well, don't try to make Jesus somehow in his divinity as God somehow, oh, she's the mother of God. You know what? You know what? Here's why that's a misleading term and even if things are technically accurate, just like it's technically accurate then to say David's the father of God, it's still stupid and absurd because it's misleading because if I say mother of God, you know what it sounds like? It sounds like she brought God into existence and she didn't bring God into existence and that's why that's a foolish term that makes no sense. It puts her one click above God and you know, you say, well, that's not what they mean. Really, that's funny because when I look at Catholics in Phoenix, Arizona, Mary is definitely higher on the list than God to them. I don't see anything about God or Jesus in their front yard. Everything's Mary. Now if you would, turn to Jeremiah chapter 7. I got to hurry up for sake of time here, Jeremiah chapter 7. So I want to talk about this term that Catholics use, the queen of heaven. Not only do they call her mother of God, but they call her queen of heaven. In this article that I was reading about the Elvis song, they were talking about how wonderful it was, how the king of rock and roll is praising the queen of heaven. Oh, it's so wonderful. But here's the thing about that, in Mesa, Arizona, you have a business called queen of heaven Catholic cemetery and funeral home and all across America you have queen of heaven Catholic church, queen of heaven cemetery, queen of heaven funeral home, queen of heaven gateway to hell. But anyway, Jeremiah chapter 7 verse 15 says, I will cast you out of my sight as I've cast out all your brother and even the whole seed of Ephraim, therefore pray not thou for this people, neither lift up cry nor prayer for them, neither make intercession to me, for I will not hear thee. Seest thou not what they do in the cities of Judah and in the streets of Jerusalem? Now God's pretty mad here. He's saying, man, don't even pray for these people. They're so bad. I don't even want to hear it. And now he's going to say what they do. That's so bad. The children gather wood and the fathers kindle the fire and the women need their dough verse 18 to make cakes to the queen of heaven and to pour out drink offerings unto other gods that they may provoke me to anger. Do they provoke me to anger, said the Lord? Do they not provoke themselves to the confusion of their own faces? So God's super angry before and after the statement that says they're baking cakes to the queen of heaven and pouring out drink offerings to other gods. Well, you know what? That's exactly what the Roman Catholics are doing. You go to the Catholic mass and they got their little cake that they bake and they got their drink offering and they are worshiping the queen of heaven and they even call her the queen of heaven. Look in the Bible for the term queen of heaven. You're never going to find it about Mary, but you'll find in Jeremiah seven people worshiping the queen of heaven, which makes the Lord enraged. Now go forward to Jeremiah chapter 44 Jeremiah chapter 44 folks, these are the only times in scripture where you will find the term queen of heaven used only in Jeremiah seven and Jeremiah 44. You're not going to find it in reference to Mary. So where are they getting their doctrine? Is it from the Bible? No, because if they, if they studied queen of heaven in the Bible, they'd know, oh, this is something pagan. We shouldn't say that. But just as they've come up with this unbiblical term, mother of God, they've also got this other unbiblical term, the queen of heaven. Jeremiah 44 verse number 16 as for the word of the Lord that thou has spoken at us in the name of the Lord, we will not hearken unto thee. And this is every Catholic talking. One billion Catholics are saying this right now, but we will certainly do whatsoever thing go forth out of our own mouth to burn incense under the queen of heaven. And that's what they do, don't they? They have their little shrine and they burn their incense and that when they looks like they're emptying a dust buster, that's some kind of incense or something fragrance to burn incense under the queen of heaven and to pour out drink offerings under her. As we have done, we and, and our fathers are Kings and our princes. And this is what Catholic say, well, we've been doing this for hundreds of years. I was Catholic born and Catholic bread, and when I die, I'll be Catholic dead and in hell. And they just always fall back on, oh, it's tradition, it's the oldest church. Yeah. It's as old as Satan. It's as old as Cain. It's as old as Balaam. It's as old as all of the wickedness that has always been in this world. What does this think about being the oldest religion? The Hindus try to say, oh, we're the oldest religion. Yeah, you're as old as the Tower of Babel. And so this thing of, oh, you know, we've done it, our fathers did it and my dad was Catholic and my grandma was Catholic and my great grandma was Catholic and, and we've been Catholic and we're, well, you know what? It's time to repent of your paganism and not worship the false gods that your fathers worshiped on the other side of the flood, but rather choose to serve the Lord and get out of that pagan idolatrous cult called the Roman Catholic Church. It's so funny how the Roman Catholic Church likes to call other denominations of Christianity cults and sects. You know, last time I checked, the word cult has to do with worshiping or lifting up or following a certain man. You know, you think about in the 20th century, the word cult was applied to Joseph Stalin. Any history book about the Soviet Union will talk about the cult of personality surrounding Joseph Stalin. Okay. When we think of cults, we think of what? David Koresh, right? Lifting up this man, exalting his, we think of Joseph Smith with the Book of Mormon. We think of, uh, the Seventh-day Adventist with Ellen G. White. That's what we think of as cults. Okay. Well, what about a guy who is this representative of God on earth, the Pope that people are worshiping and his word trumps the Bible and in the 20th century he can make some pronouncement in the 20th century that Mary ascended up to heaven, which that's a doctrine that came out officially for the Roman Catholic Church somewhere around 1950. Don't quote me exactly on that year, but around 1950 the Pope declared that Mary ascended to heaven. She didn't die a normal death. Now the Bible said that a sword would pierce her soul, you know, so she, she probably is martyred, but we don't know, but maybe she was, maybe she wasn't, but I'll promise you one thing. She did not ascend up to heaven. That is absurd as unbiblical, made up garbage. But if you have this man who can just have these new revelations that are found nowhere in the Bible and just, it just becomes on par with scripture, that sounds like the biggest cult in the world where you go to church every week and they tell you that you're eating human flesh and drinking human blood literally. You're literally eating human, hey, I just joined this great religion. There's this guy in Rome and he basically is the vicar of Christ on earth and when he speaks ex cathedra, he's infallible, he can say no wrong and we get together every week and we eat human flesh and drink human blood literally. Isn't it wonderful? Everybody would say, man, you're in a weird cult. But yet I just described for you Roman Catholicism doesn't matter to them what the Bible says. Doesn't matter what the Bible says about the queen of heaven. Doesn't matter what it says about not calling the priest father. Doesn't matter that no monks or nuns are mentioned anywhere in the Bible. Doesn't matter to them that the Bible says salvation is by grace through faith, not of works as any man should boast. None of this matters to them. What matters is that their fathers and their kings and their princes, verse 21, and the people of the land, you know, that's all that they care about is their tradition that they've been worshiping the queen of heaven for so long. Sorry, verse 17 is what I meant. Our fathers, our kings, our princes, and the cities of Judah and they said, well then when we did that, then had we plenty of vittles and were well and saw no evil. But since we left off, verse 18, to burn incense to the queen of heaven and to pour out drink offerings under her, we've wanted all things and have been consumed by the sword and by the famine. And when we burned incense to the queen of heaven and poured out drink offerings under her, did we make her cakes to worship her and pour out her drink offerings under her without our man? So who are the spokesmen here? Women. They're like, yeah, but when we did it, did we do it without our man? Wait, honey, you did it too, right? Yes, dear. Yes, I did it too. Yes. Yeah, we do. Did we do it without our men? No, they did it too, right? Right, Herbert? Yes. Oh yes, dear. Yes, Mabel, that's what we did. And you know, folks, the Roman Catholic religion is, among other things, perverse because it basically is worshiping a female as the primary object of veneration, at least in Mexico, at least in Phoenix, Arizona. That's all you see everywhere. It's all about Mary, okay? Well this doesn't really make sense because God is God the Father, okay? And so this isn't necessarily a religion that appeals to dudes because if you think about it, dudes innately have this understanding that, you know, in a home obviously the man is the head of the household and that the wife is to submit to her husband. This is the way the world works. Even unsaved people, even people who aren't even Christians, you know, I have a friend who's agnostic, he's not Christian at all, doesn't believe the Bible at all, but he says, oh, my wife and I have an understanding that I wear the pants in the family and I'm the boss and so forth. Is that a religious thing? No, because all over the world in multitudes of different cultures and religions, it doesn't matter if we're talking Hindus or whatever, you know, it's just natural and normal that men lead. Men are supposed to lead. That's the natural. Now of course we live in a backward time where people aren't even sure which bathroom to use, so therefore of course in the age of 67 genders, yeah, you know, women lead. But in a normal society, men are the leaders. That's the norm. So it's kind of this religion is kind of weird where you're, you're basically making it all about worshiping a woman. That feels wrong, feels weird because it is wrong. It is weird. It isn't biblical. It's nothing against women. It's just that women are not in a leadership role in this world. That's not the way that God has ordained things at this time. God in the Garden of Eden had made that pronouncement that Adam is going to rule over his wife and that's just the way it is. Okay, so this goes against the grain and so what I've noticed is that typically followers of Catholicism, and I'm not, look, I'm not saying that this goes across the board, but I've noticed a lot of effeminate dudes that were Catholic and a lot of Catholicism seemed like it was just basically promoted by women. It was just a lot of women were super into it. It was like mainly pushed by women, more women showing up for services, more women, and maybe I'm wrong and I'm not, and obviously I'm painting with a broad brush because there's a, there's a billion Catholics. I'm sure that there are a ton of really manly, uh, Catholic dudes. I'm not doubting that for one second, but I'm just saying in general in America, in my experience, what I've seen, maybe I'm wrong, but I've just seemed to observe just a lot of just kind of effeminate Catholics and just a lot of female Catholics. There's women promoting Catholicism and effeminate dudes that are into it. It seems like the manlier dudes aren't really that into it when it comes to Catholicism. It seems like when you think of a guy going into the priesthood, you kind of think of a, of a soft boy. Maybe I'm wrong. I'm just giving you my perspective and I, and I think that I also have the spirit of God, you know, I think, and I think a lot of other people probably have noticed and observed the same thing. The Catholic priests tend to be a little bit of feminine. It seems like the more into Catholicism they are usually the softer and more feminine they are and a lot of women are really into it. You don't really see a lot of manly men getting all psyched up about praying to Mary. And what do we see in scripture? Who's worshiping the queen of heaven? Who is the driving force behind worshiping the queen of heaven? Is it men in the Bible? Because you say, well pastor, so you're just up here giving your opinion. You're just kind of shooting from the hip and just talking about stuff that you've seen. But hold on a second. Didn't we just read the Bible to only two scriptures about worshiping the queen of heaven and isn't it a female driven religion because they're like, well men were there too. I mean, they, do we do it without them? I mean, we didn't do it without them folks. That means that they are driving this and that the husbands are going along with it, but then it is women who are the driving force. And let me tell you something, whenever you have a religion where women are the driving force, it's a false religion, biblical religion, men are the driving force. Man of God should be the driving force. That's why the Bible says, let the woman learn in silence with all subjection, but I suffer not a woman to teach nor do you serve authority over the man, but to be in silence. First Corinthians 14, let your women keep silence in the churches for it's not permitted them to speak. Now look, the deacon, the pastor, they're supposed to be men. The ones preaching and teaching us the word of God in the new Testament church are men. And so when you have religion being led by women, something's wrong. If you have a church where the church is filled with women. No dudes, that's a red flag. That's something, something off there. Why can't that church attract men? Why can they only attract women? Maybe because what's going on feels a little effeminate. And how many effeminate preachers have we seen on TV? How many effeminate preachers have we seen in literature, right? There's this image of a soft watered down effeminate preacher. That's not really going to draw a lot of men. And so you'll find churches where it's just filled with women. Or how about religions founded by women? Like the Seventh Day Adventists, where it's all about Ellen G. White. How about the Four Square Church, which is what Calvary Chapel came out of. We talked about that in the Jesus Revolution sermon. Founded by Sister Amy, there we go. So basically, yeah, Amy and Ellen and whatever, you know, these are not the founders of actual righteous movements of God, okay? Now God greatly used women in the Bible, but it's never been God's will for them to take front and center and found a religion, start the church, preach the sermons, teach in the New Testament church. That's not what the New Testament even begins to teach, okay? And so what do we see here in Jeremiah 44? That this worship of the Queen of Heaven is driven by women, okay? I'm almost out of time, but if you would flip over to 1 Kings chapter 2. Last place we'll turn, 1 Kings chapter 2. So I looked up on the Wikipedia article for Queen of Heaven. This cracked me up. So Wikipedia, Queen of Heaven, here's what it says, Queen of Heaven is a title given to the Virgin Mary by Christians mainly of the Catholic Church and to a lesser extent in Anglicanism, Lutheranism, and Eastern Orthodoxy. So not only are Roman Catholics calling her the Queen of Heaven, but apparently Anglicans, Lutherans, and East Orthodox, and I know East Orthodox are big on worshiping Mary, but apparently Anglicans and Lutherans are into this as well. This title has long been a tradition included in prayers and devotional literature and seen in Western art in the subject of the coronation of the Virgin from the High Middle Ages long before it was given a formal definition status by the church. So you scroll down on this article and there's a section called Biblical Basis. Where in the world are we going to go in the Bible to find a Biblical basis for the Queen of Heaven? Because I just showed you the only two times in the Bible that Queen of Heaven's mentioned. It's a false god. Biblical basis. Here's what it says. In the Hebrew Bible, some Davidic kings had in their court a quote, great lady who was often their mother and held great power as his advisor and an advocate to him. In 1 Kings 2.20, Solomon said to his mother Bathsheba, seated on a throne at his right, make your request mother for I will not refuse you. William G. Most sees here a sort of type of Mary. Well, I mean, what a great point. I mean, hmm, okay, can I start my sermon over? Because that's a pretty powerful point. I mean, I thought this had no biblical basis. But now that I think about it, you know, Solomon does picture Jesus, doesn't he? I mean, Solomon's a wonderful picture of Jesus because Solomon's the son of David. And Solomon rules over this kingdom of peace just like one day Jesus is going to rule and reign in the millennium in a kingdom of peace. And I forgot about how Bathsheba had all this power and influence over him and how he told her that if she makes his request, her request that he's not going to tell her no. This is the most misleading garbage ever because did they even bother to look up the verse? Because they said, well, you know, I mean, Bathsheba's sitting right there and she says make your request mother for I will not refuse you. Now let's look at what the Bible actually says, 1 Kings 2.20. Then she said, I desire one small petition of thee. Can I just get this one little thing from you? I pray thee say me not nay. And the king said unto her, ask on my mother, for I will not say thee nay. This is where the Catholics stop reading. We're going to keep going. We're going to push through. And she said, let Abishag the Shunammite be given to Adonijah, thy brother to wife. And Solomon said, your wish is my command, mother dearest. No, that's not what he said. Listen, listen to what he says. Then King Solomon answered and said to his mother, and why dost thou ask Abishag the Shunammite for Adonijah? Ask from the kingdom also, for he is my elder brother. And look, this is sarcasm. Anyone would agree this is sarcasm. Is he actually serious when he says, hey, ask from the kingdom also? I mean, this is the definition of sarcasm. Hey, why don't you ask for his kingdom also? Hey, he is my elder brother after all. Why doesn't he just be king instead of me? He's blowing up. He's like, woman, what have I to do with thee? Why does thou ask Abishag the Shunammite for Adonijah verse 22? Ask from the kingdom also, for he's my elder brother, even for him and hey, for Abishag the priest and for Joab the son of Zeruiah. Then King Solomon swear by the Lord saying, God do so to me and more also, if Adonijah have not spoken this word against his own life. Now therefore is the Lord liveth, which has established me and set me on the throne of David, my father, and who has made me and houses he promised, Adonijah shall be put to death this day. And King Solomon sent by the hand of Benaiah the son of Joab and he fell upon him that he died. I'm starting to think that this might actually be a really good picture of the Virgin Mary. Pray to Mary and you die. Think about it. I mean, it actually, I think most has a point because if you think about it in the story, so Bathsheba represents Mary, Solomon represents Jesus. And so we go to Mary and ask Mary to intercede for us to Jesus. And Jesus kills us as a punishment. I'm sold. So I think this guy's a lot smarter than people have given him credit for. William G. Most sees here a sort of type of Mary. So do I. So do I. Mary and go to hell because of the fact that you're not going through the one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, you're going through the woman Mary instead of the man Christ Jesus. And so Mariolatry has no biblical basis, okay? This is obviously just a perfect example of Catholics not caring what the Bible says. Now look, the reason I preach this sermon is because of the fact that A, want to make sure we remember that Catholicism is a false religion because if you go to liberal churches that don't preach sermons like this, half the people in the pew think like, oh, Catholics are Christians. Yeah, they're saved. You know, they're folks, they're pagans. Why do we need to realize that it's just, just cause we just want to be negative toward Catholics. No, it's because we need to realize their loss so that we can love them and get them saved. Right? If we realize their loss, then we can reach out to them and try to help them receive Christ as savior and stop following a pagan false religion. Okay. So we need to know that Catholics are not Bible believing Christians. That's important. Number one. But number two, I think something that all of us can apply, cause obviously none of us were thinking about joining the Roman Catholic church anytime soon. You're like, well, pastor Anderson, I was never tempted to pray to Mary and I don't even like Elvis. Okay. Well, here's the thing about that, okay? Is that even if we are not in danger of getting recruited by the Catholic church, we want to realize that they're lost so that we can evangelize them. But number two, there's this attitude that can creep in to Bible believing Christians that says, Hey, we need to go back and figure out what the church fathers believed and we need to go back to older forms of Christianity and we need to go back and see what the oldest, most ancient traditions are. And the problem is that the person, the group that controls that narrative is the Roman Catholic church because the Roman Catholic church, they're the ones who decide in many cases which books go in the fire and which ones get preserved. They've been preserving stuff for the last couple thousand years that fit their narrative. And so they save all the church fathers that are into sprinkling and infant baptism and worshiping Mary. That's why the Wikipedia article can say, well, yeah, you know, some of this was only really established in the 20th century formally, but all throughout the middle ages you have all this artwork and theologians and preachers saying, yeah, because it goes all the way back to the book of Jeremiah. Satan has always been leading people to do these things. Folks, I don't want to hear about historical Christianity, historical Protestantism, the historical Baptist, historical fundamentalism. Take all the history and just hang it. I'm not interested in any of it. I'm interested in what the word of God says. There are two things I need to know the truth. I need the word of God and I need the Holy Ghost. And if I've got the word of God and the Holy Ghost, that's going to lead me into all truth. Whereas studying history, well, history is written by the winners, right? Isn't it interesting how the good guys win virtually every war that you read about? It's like every war is won by the good guys almost always. Why is that? Because the one who wins controls the narrative. That's why. Okay. The Catholic Church has been controlling the narrative because they're the biggest cult, the biggest pagan fraud. And so they've been controlling the narrative. Why? Because broad's the way that leads to destruction and many their buttes go in there and tons of people love Roman Catholicism, a billion people follow it. They control the narrative. So don't, here's the problem with the Protestants. The Protestants are basically digging into all this ancient Catholic garbage and trying to keep a lot of it instead of just letting the Holy Spirit and letting the word of God guide them and being sola scriptura as their motto says, you know, as I've said, I would be a Protestant if it weren't for Protestants, you know, because the Protestants are nothing like their sola scriptura, sola fide. If they were actually sola scriptura, sola fide, you know, I'd be like, Amen all day long. But the problem is, though, they still want to sprinkle babies. Some of them even want to still talk about the mother of God. They still want to have a queen of heaven and all this stuff. Why? Because they're saying, well, we got to go back to the historical and the fathers and both. No, we don't. You know, we need in 2023 Holy Ghost Bible. That's it. Let's listen to preaching by living, breathing preachers that are preaching to us the word of God. And we can search the scripture daily, whether these things are so, and I don't care what some theologian from 300 years ago said, because he is trying to get along with Catholics or or be soft on the Catholics or or try to prove that he's not a cult. I'm not a cult because, you know, Augustine agrees with me here. You know, nuts to him, nuts to Augustine, Augustine was full of baloney. All I care about is what the Bible says and what other saved Christians preach from the Bible today because they have the Holy Spirit. And that's what I care. That's where I get truth from the spirit filled reading and preaching of God's word. Let's bow our heads and have a word of prayer. Father, we thank you so much for your word, Lord. We thank you so much for the fact that we have a mediator in the Lord Jesus Christ, Lord. And please, Lord, help us to realize that he is the only mediator and that no man cometh unto the Father, but by him. And so we thank you for Christ's substitutionary death on the cross and his bodily resurrection. And Lord, I pray that one billion Roman Catholics would hear the gospel and that and that we would be able to witness to many of them and and get them to understand that salvation is by faith and that it's not by works. It's not by following the rituals and works of the Catholic Church, but that it's simply by believing in Christ. And it's in Christ's name we pray. Amen.