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

Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you very much. I don't think she ever left. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. It came upon the midnight clear, That glorious song of old, Some angels bending near the earth, To touch their arms of gold. Peace on earth, earth who hail to men, From that and all great ages here, The world in solemn stillness lay, To hear the angels sing. Still through the glow and skies they come, With peaceful wings unfurled, And still their heavy music flows o'er all the weary roads. Above it's sad and lonely plains, They bend on coloring wings, And ever o'er as Bethel sounds, God bless it, angels sing. For any beneath life's crushing low, Whose forms are bending low, Whose toll along the climbing wave, With hateful stems and sores, The careful land of golden hours, Goes swiftly on the wind. Oh, rest beside the weary roads, And hear the angels sing. For lo! the days are hasting on, Like profit for art foretold, When with the ever circling years, Comes round the age of gold. When peace shall over all the earth, Its ancient splendor's fleeing, And the whole world give back the song, Which now the angels sing. Amen. Your Father, we just thank you again that we can come here tonight to hear your word being preached, and I just pray you'd help us all to grow and be edified by the sermon, help us to apply to our lives, to listen carefully. And Blessed Pastor Shelley, fill him with your Holy Spirit as he preaches to us. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen. Next is going to be 187, Jesus loves me. Song number 187, I want to hear all the kids shout it nice and loud. Everybody should know this one, right? 187, Jesus loves me. Jesus loves me this I know, For the Bible tells me so, Little ones to him belong, They are weak but he is strong. Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me. The Bible tells me so. Jesus loves me, he who died, Heaven's gate to open wide, He will wash away my sin, Let his little child come in. Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me. The Bible tells me so. Jesus loves me, he will stay, Close beside me all the way, Thou hast bled and died for me, I will henceforth live for thee. Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me. Yes, Jesus loves me. The Bible tells me so. Thank you so much for being here. If you don't have a bullet, say you can lift up your hand nice and high. Welcome to Steadfast Baptist Church. On the inside we have our service and soul winning times. And we have our church stats. I'm going to get an account for soul winning. I had four that was outside of anything to report some past weeks. But then I'm going to also get this last Thursday. Was there anything from Thursday? One for Thursday. What about Friday? Anything from Friday by chance? Four for Friday. And then what about Saturday? Was there anything on Saturday? It's like five. What about today? I know the church band had nine. What was outside of that? Looks like we had 19 for today. Praise the Lord on that. Keep up the great work on soul winning. And then on the right we have our list of expecting ladies. Continue to pray for them. We have our prayer list. We have the note about the Brownsville Mathemoros soul winning man. And I highly encourage you to talk to any of the people that participated. It seemed like from my perspective everybody really enjoyed themselves. We had a great time of fellowship and fun. And it was actually pretty easy to get into Mexico and get back. And so it's actually really easy to get in there. But coming back it's just a line. But other than that I mean it was pretty simple getting into and out of. And even the Brownsville area was you know a nice area to be in and everything like that. And it's only like an hour flight. So you know it's not even that hard to get down there. I think McAllen and Brownsville is about an hour flight. You can fly down there. And so hopefully in the future we'll just keep going down there. It's real receptive. And so continue to pray for the people that are down there. We actually met some first time people for us. Some new people to soul winning and things like that. They went out soul winning with us and everything like that. So you know we go down to these areas we still reach people. People that are soul winners for the first time or new soul winners and everything like that. We're able to encourage them and help them to learn how to go soul winning. And so it's great to participate in these kind of events and meet new friends and everything like that. On the back we have the note about our upcoming events. Our Christmas caroling is this Tuesday. And then the 17th this Friday is our ladies Christmas party. We also have a baby shower that Saturday. The 19th we have our yearbook pictures make up day. Or you know for the users that didn't sign up you're just automatically grafted in. Alright so you're drafted and grafted in so we're going to come and pressure you. Alright or just take a picture. So the 22nd we have our candlelight service and cookie bake off. We have the 31st we have our New Year's Eve party at 7. And then down below we have a couple notes and announcements about that. That's pretty much all I had for announcements this evening. We'll go ahead and go to our third song. 420. Again that's 420. There's a song in the air. Altogether on the first. There's a song in the air. There's a star in the sky. There's a mother's deep prayer. And a baby's low cry. And the storm raises far while the beautiful sing. For the manger of Matlock and cradle's a king. There's a tumult of joy. Oh the wonderful bird. For the virgin sweet boy. Is the loan of the earth. And the storm raises far while the beautiful sing. For the manger of Matlock and cradle's a king. In the light of that star by the ages and world. And that song from afar that's left over the world. Every earth is a flame and the beautiful sing. In the homes of the nations that Jesus is King. We rejoice in the light. And we echo the song that comes out through the night. From the heavenly dawn. I wish out to the lovely angel they bring. And we greet in his cradle our Savior and King. As the offering plates go around please turn in your Bibles to Exodus chapter 20. Exodus chapter 20. Exodus chapter 20 the Bible reads. And God spake all these words saying. I am the Lord thy God which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have no other gods before me. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them nor serve them. For I the Lord thy God am a jealous God visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me. And showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments. Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain. Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days shalt thou labor and do all thy work. But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God. In it thou shalt not do any work thou nor thy son nor thy daughter thy manservant nor thy maidservant nor thy cattle nor thy stranger that is within thy gates. For in six days the Lord made heaven and earth the sea and all that in them is and rested the seventh day. Wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day and hallowed it. Honor thy father and thy mother that thy days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy God giveth thee. Thou shalt not kill. Thou shalt not commit adultery. Thou shalt not steal. Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's house. Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's wife nor his manservant nor his maidservant nor his ox nor his ass nor anything that is thy neighbor's. And all the people saw the thunderings and the lightnings and the noise of the trumpet and the mountains smoking. And when the people saw it they were moved and stood afar off. And they said unto Moses speak thou with us and we will hear but let not God speak with us lest we die. And Moses said unto the people fear not for God has come to prove you and that his fear may be before your faces that ye sin not. And the people stood afar off and Moses drew near under the thick darkness where God was. And the Lord said unto Moses thus shalt thou say unto the children of Israel ye have seen that I have talked with you from heaven. Ye shall not make with me gods of silver neither shall ye make unto you gods of gold. And altar of earth thou shalt make unto me and shalt sacrifice there on thy burnt offerings and thy peace offerings thy sheep and thine oxen. In all places where I record my name I will come unto thee and I will bless thee. And if thou would make me an altar of stone thou shalt not build it of hewn stone. For if thou lift up thy tool upon it thou hast polluted it. Neither shalt thou go up by steps unto mine altar that thy nakedness be not discovered thereon. Let's pray. Dear Heavenly Father, Lord, thank you for all the souls that were one today and during the trip. I pray, Lord, you would fill Pastor Shelley with your spirit. Allow him to be edified that he might edify us and help us apply the message to our lives to be better Christians. In Jesus' name, Amen. And the title of the sermon this evening is Idols and Graven Images. Idols and Graven Images. Look at verse 4 again. The Bible says, Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above or that is in the earth beneath or that is in the water under the earth. Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them nor serve them for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children under the third and fourth generation of them that hate me and showing mercy unto thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments. Now this is known as the second commandment of the Bible. The first is thou shalt have no other gods before me. But the second commandment is a little bit of a multifaceted commandment in the sense that it has a few different instructions here. And I think the second part, you know, as far as America is concerned or Christianity is concerned, a lot of people are probably on board with. A lot of people kind of understand how this is wrong. But it feels like the first part of this instruction or this commandment, people are confused or people don't really understand. But I believe it's just as straightforward and just as simple as far as verse number 5. But verse number 4 makes it very clear. Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image. I mean, the Bible just plainly states that you're not supposed to make graven images. And I believe that it's wrong for us to possess, own, make graven images or statues or structures or these type of things. And the Bible makes it very clear that it's specifically related to things that are in heaven or on the earth or under the earth. And in later portions of the Scripture, it will give you more specific examples of what the Bible means by this. But the Bible is real clear that you're not supposed to make these things. Now additionally, it also says that you're also not supposed to bow down and worship them and they're not supposed to be gods. And really, I think the Bible makes a little bit of a distinction here between the idea of a graven image and an idol. You know, obviously, an idol is kind of going beyond just simply a graven image in the sense that it's actually representing, you know, maybe a false god or something that you kind of are worshiping. But even if it wasn't, you know, a false god or something you're necessarily deciding to worship, I believe even just making the graven image in and of itself is also wrong. Now go to Deuteronomy chapter number 4. Go to Deuteronomy chapter 4. I want to prove these things to you in the Bible this evening. But go to Deuteronomy chapter number 4 and we're going to get more instruction here. Now Deuteronomy is kind of a reiteration of the commandments that God has given us. And really, when it comes to the commandments in the Bible, it's hard to find commandments that are going to be more important than the Ten Commandments, okay? I mean, these are some of the more prolific commandments in the Bible, some of the more emphasized commandments in the Word of God, and for good reason. You know, idolatry is not a minor sin in the Bible. It's not a minor issue. It's not something that only a few people are affected by. But rather, it's a major sin that affects a lot of religion, a lot of cultures, a lot of people. And so the commandments, in my opinion, really kind of trickle down as far as importance. We kind of have thus sort of no other gods before me. Obviously, that's probably the most important. You've got to only have the Lord, right? You need to have the Lord as your God. He's the one you would worship. The second commandment, though, is going to be really, really important, really emphasized. You're not supposed to make graven images. You're not supposed to bow down to these things. You're not supposed to worship them. And it's something that we see in the Bible as a major temptation for the children of Israel, a major struggle, something that they constantly are violating and really falling back into. And really, religions of today, many of them struggle with idolatry, graven images, and these type of false religion aspects. Even within Christianity, you have the Catholics. And the Catholics are major idolaters. They have tons of graven images in their churches, in their religion, and everything like that. And the Bible gets really explicit as far as what a graven image is. Now, right before we get to this, I just want to read for the context, chapter number 4. Look at verse 1. It says, Now, the Lord's emphasizing that these commandments He's giving them are very important. You're not supposed to add in the extras, but also you're not supposed to diminish ought. Now, what's ought? Ought is just anything, just even just a little bit. He doesn't want you to just diminish the Word of God even just a hair or the commandments just a hair. He wants them to be followed strictly, you know, correctly, not just like, well, we got most of it. You know, we got portions of it. And you have to understand, even though it's the Ten Commandments, there's a lot of instructions even found within the commandments. You know, like, thou shall not covet. It starts labeling lots of things, right, like your house, your neighbor's wife. It's not like, well, I don't covet my neighbor's wife, but I do covet his house. Well, that would be diminishing that commandment. You're not supposed to covet anything. Or when the Bible says, honor thy father and thy mother, it's not okay, well, I honor my father, but I don't have to honor my mother. No, you have to honor both. There's still multi aspects to that particular commandment. So the Bible is saying you're not supposed to make any graven image and you're not supposed to bow down to it. It's not okay to say like, well, I don't bow down to it, but I did make it. No, you want to follow all of it. You don't want to diminish ought from any of the commandments or try to cherry pick which aspects of the commandments you're going to follow and say, well, I'll honor my mother but not my father. No, you got to honor both, okay? You don't want to diminish any aspect of the commandment. Now, look at verse 13. The Bible says, and he declared unto you his covenant which he commanded you to perform even ten commandments and he wrote them upon two tables of stone. Now, let me remind you something. The ten commandments were literally written by God. I mean, God with his own finger wrote, thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image. I mean, God literally wrote that in Hebrew, obviously not English per se. But he literally wrote that commandment into stone. Now, don't you think that would be a little important if it's like God took the time to write something in stone. He was like, well, I don't know. Now, it's a really important commandment. It's a really important instruction. He says in verse 14, the Lord commanded me at that time to teach you statutes and judgments that you might do them in the land whether you go over to possess it. Take ye therefore good heed unto yourselves for you saw no manner of similitude on the day that the Lord spake unto you in Horeb out of the midst of the fire. Now, what he's saying is this event of the delivering of the word of God is extremely unique. Meaning you've never had God deliver the word of God like this ever before. And this is an extremely unique scenario. I mean, God's coming down on the mount. The mount is smoking. Moses is coming down with tables of stone that have literally been written by the finger of God. I mean, talk about an original autograph, right? Talk about the originals. I mean, that's pretty special, isn't it? Moses goes ahead and breaks it, doesn't he? But at the end of the day, you know, we're talking about something really special. And so he's like, take heed unto this. I mean, this is important. This is God's word. And you say, why? Verse 16, lest ye corrupt yourselves and make you a graven image. I mean, what is the Bible saying? He's saying you've got to take heed to this. I don't want you to corrupt yourself. How could you corrupt yourself? You make a graven image. Now, he says, what is a graven image? The similitude of any figure, the likeness of male or female. Notice there's only two options, okay? 17, the likeness of any beast that is on the earth, the likeness of any winged fowl that flyeth in the air, the likeness of anything that creepeth on the ground, the likeness of any fish that is in the waters beneath the earth, okay? So when the Bible gets real explicit, it's pretty much picturing, you know, creatures, animals, birds, and humans. It's basically saying, like, don't make a man, don't make a woman, don't make a dog, don't make a cat, don't make a whale, don't make a little fishy, don't make a little birdie. You know, none of these things are acceptable. You're not supposed to make any of them. And he then elaborates just saying in verse number 19, unless thou lift up thine eyes into heaven, and when thou seest the sun and the moon and the stars, even all the host of heaven shouldest be driven to worship them and serve them as the Lord thy God hath divided into all nations under the whole heaven. Now, here's the interesting thing about this section, okay? He does mention worshipping, but he only mentions worshipping, like, the stars and the sky. He didn't even mention them worshipping these creatures that they created. He's just saying don't even make them. And then he elaborates and goes even further saying, and when you look up in the stars and the skies, you start worshipping them too. He's like, I just don't want you to worship the creation. You're supposed to worship the creator. You know, and much better than your graven image of these things is God's actual creation of them. You know, if you want to enjoy the things that God has made, there's nothing wrong with that. There's nothing wrong with a zoo, per se. You know, going to the zoo and seeing a live bear, a live, you know, animal, some kind of interesting giraffe or some kind of interesting fish or something. There's nothing wrong with observing God's creation and enjoying God's creation or going into the wilderness and noticing animals or wildlife or the fish or, you know, there's nothing wrong with looking at people, right? But what would be wrong is to worship people, to worship animals, to worship these images and to decorate things with these, you know, graven images and giving them more emphasis and preeminence than they're really entitled to. You know, that's not the right attitude. And when you start, you know, going down this track, you end up going to even further where you end up start worshipping it, calling it God and really going off into the deep end of wicked false religion, okay? But it's got to start somewhere. You know, in order to worship an idol, you have to have one. I mean, it's impossible to even worship it when you don't even have it. So the first way to cut off idolatry is just not even have graven images. If you just don't even have graven images, it's literally impossible to worship them. So it's a great way to stop or to cut right at the cord idolatry is just eliminate all graven images, eliminate all idolatry. And I'll admit to you right now that in the Bible, you know, worshipping the false gods and having false religion is more emphasized than just making it, okay? But that doesn't change the fact the Bible has clear commandments saying not to make it. And I liken this doctrine under the doctrine of alcohol, okay? And I will submit to you that when it comes to alcohol, the Bible emphasizes not being drunk, okay? And over and over, not being drunk, drunkards, the wickedness of being, you know, basically blacked out or the evils of drunkenness. But you know what? It's also wrong to just drink alcohol. You know, and there's a few verses in the Bible. There's some sections of the Bible that teach that you shouldn't even drink at all. And so here's the thing. I'm not going to diminish the doctrine of alcohol by saying, well, it only says don't be drunk. No, it also says not even look at it is what the Bible also says, okay? And you know how you never get drunk? By never drinking alcohol. Now, I'll submit that if someone had a thimble full of beer, that's not nearly as bad as drinking a whole case of liquor, okay? Yeah, I get it. Sure. And so I will submit to you that someone having a graven image is nowhere near the same as worshipping it and falling down and praying to it and all the other nonsense that's associated with idolatry. But that doesn't change the fact that both are wrong. It doesn't change the fact that they're both against the Word of God. And I don't even want to get to where I'm breaking any commandment at any level. You know, I want to be perfect with the Lord God and making sure that I'm not even doing anything that's displeasing in His sight. You know, just because the Bible says thou shalt not murder doesn't mean you can punch someone in the face. It doesn't mean you can beat them half to death. Well, I didn't kill them, you know. No, you just want to make sure that you're not breaking any commandment or causing any sin. And when you allow the graven images and you allow these pictures, you know, these, not pictures, but just, when it says images, statues, these kind of, you know, creations or whatever, into the world, you're setting up yourself for lots of idolatry and a lot of wickedness to come alongside of that. Now look at verse 23. We're still in chapter 4. Look at verse 23. The Bible says, Take heed on yourselves lest ye forget the covenant of the Lord your God which He made with you. So when you forget God's Word, what happens? And make you a graven image. When you forget the Word of God, like the Catholics like to conveniently do and change the Ten Commandments, what do they do? They end up making them graven image or the likeness of anything which the Lord thy God hath forbidden thee. And notice there's just a period there. What happens when you forget the Word of God? You start making graven images. And I will submit to you that no culture or religion has a problem with making graven images outside of the Christianity and the Bible. So it makes sense that when people don't know the Bible, they don't know the Ten Commandments, they don't know the Word of God, what would stop them from making graven images? Nothing. But notice when people forget, they corrupt themselves and make a graven image. And notice what it does. It provokes God to anger. Okay, I'm skipping ahead to verse 25. Let's read some more. Verse 24. For the Lord thy God is a consuming fire, even a jealous God. When thou shalt beget children and children's children, and ye shall have remained long in the land, and shall corrupt yourselves and make a graven image, or the likeness of any thing, and shall do evil in the sight of the Lord thy God, to provoke Him to anger, I will call heaven and earth to witness against you this day, that ye shall soon utterly perish from out the land, whereinto ye go over Jordan to possess it, ye shall not prolong your days upon it, but shall utterly be destroyed. Now, if you read these verses and you've never been exposed to anything else, how would you think we should feel about graven images? I mean, isn't the Bible, like, really clear here? Isn't it saying that God's, like, really mad about it and it provokes Him to anger? It says just for making them, He would cause them to be destroyed from the land. Now, of course, of course, worshipping the things way worse. I'm not saying that that's great either. I'm not saying that that isn't a wicked sin. What I am saying is that we should go all the way back to the root. Let's go back to the verse number 4 of Exodus 20 where it says thou shalt not even make it. Just don't even make it. Just don't even own it. Just don't even possess these things because there's no benefit. It angers God. God doesn't like it. And I'm going to explain some of the reasons why, but go to chapter 5 and look at verse 8. Thou shalt not make thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the waters beneath the earth. And it elaborates again, thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, unto them, nor serve them. For I, the Lord thy God, am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children and the third and fourth generation of them, that hate me in showing mercy unto the thousands of them that love me and keep my commandments. Now again, you're saying, well, the only reason that idolatry is wrong or graven images is wrong is because people are worshipping them as a false god. But I would submit to you again that even though it's a multifaceted commandment, it's still both applicable. Just like honouring your father and your mother. That's still two different things, two different instructions theoretically. However, you have to follow both of them. It's not an either or, or, well, I have to honour both only. You just honour both. It's not like it's a package deal. It is brought up in coordination because it's obviously related. You know, what's the point of even making an image? Typically, it is to worship it. Typically, it is to honour it or you think it's some kind of a false god. That's the reason why the heathen are making them and so God's people shouldn't mimic this type of attitude or behaviour and make these type of creations. Go to Leviticus chapter 19. Go to Leviticus chapter 19. I want to go backwards and prove this even further. You know, it's Christmas time and a lot of people like lots of little statues and lots of little creations and things like that. I've even been in a Baptist church and I walked in and right on the front and centre table was this like molten graven image nativity scene. And I'm just being honest, it personally offended me. I was really shocked and I was really kind of surprised that they would have something like that. But you know, a lot of people just I guess don't really care or they just are ignorant or perhaps they have a weird view on this particular issue. But I feel like the Bible is making itself abundantly clear that you shouldn't even make these things. You shouldn't even have them. And what's the point? Because do we really know what any of the nativity people look like? Or baby Jesus or you know, these angels? And a lot of times the dudes are wearing long dresses and have long hair. It's like it's even blasphemous just beyond the fact that it's a graven image. You know, how would you feel if someone made, it's like I made a statue of you. You've got like long girly hair and you've got like a dress on or whatever. That wouldn't be cool. You wouldn't like that. You wouldn't be like, oh great, thanks for making that of me. You know, you'd want it to be like looking like Arnold Schwarzenegger with your face on it or something, you know. But either way, it's just wrong. You know, we shouldn't be sitting here and sculpting images of these people or these animals and basically trying to give them reverence that they don't deserve. You know, the Bible makes it clear that you're not supposed to make these things. Leviticus 19, look at verse 1. And the Lord spake unto Moses, saying, Speak unto all the congregation of the children of Israel, and say unto them, Ye shall be holy, for I the Lord your God am holy. Ye shall fear every man his mother and his father, and keep my Sabbaths. I am the Lord your God. Now, in this verse, he's making it clear you're supposed to what? Fear mom and you're supposed to fear dad, right? So both. And I believe that everyone would agree that you're supposed to do both of these. I mean, who would read this verse and say, well, I know it says mother here and father, but it's really just father. You're supposed to fear dad because you're supposed to fear mom because you fear dad. You don't really have to fear mom. That would be a weird interpretation, wouldn't it? That would be bizarre if you start trying to come up with weird ways to say, well, you don't really have to fear your mom. You just fear your mom because of what dad will do to you when you don't fear your mom. It's like, no, you just fear your mom. It's just that simple, right? Let's read the next verse. Turn ye not into idols, nor make yourselves molten gods. I am the Lord your God. So again, in this verse, it would be weird to break up these instructions and say like, well, the only reason you're not supposed to make a molten image is because you're turning onto the idol. So you're just not supposed to make it. You don't make a molten god. You don't make a molten image. You don't make a molten creation. You just make none of them. Go to chapter 26 for a moment. Flip to the right. Chapter 26 and look at verse number one. The Bible says, ye shall make you no idols, nor graven image, neither rear you up a standing image, neither shall you set up any image of stone in your land to bow down unto it, for I am the Lord your God. And here's the thing, you'd say, oh, okay, well, it's only if I don't bow down to it. That's a weird way to read these verses, in my opinion. I don't see how you can, you know, in my opinion. I don't see how you can read all this instruction that's so clear and then say like, well, I made it all, but I didn't bow down, eh? Eh? Obviously, that would be the main purpose of people creating these instructions, okay? And we see that throughout the Bible. Antichrist is a picture of someone that's going to bring an image that you're supposed to bow down and you're supposed to worship, right? And then there's all kinds of foreshadowing of you got people like Nebuchadnezzar creating an image that Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego and all the other princes are supposed to bow down, they're supposed to worship these graven images, these golden images. That's obviously the reason why people are setting up these statues and these images and everything like that. But why would I then want to just set it up and say like, well, let's just make sure we're not bound down to it or anything? Because the thing is, once you set it up, what's going to happen? People are going to start bowing down to it or worshiping or giving it attention that it does not deserve. Is it the end of the day? And that's not how we're supposed to live our lives as giving all this homage and all this respect under these graven idols and images and these structures. Go to Micah chapter 1. Let's see how God feels about these images in the Bible. Micah chapter 1, right before the book of Nahum, right after the book of Jonah. Micah chapter 1, look at verse number 6. The Bible says, Therefore I will make Samaria as a heap of the field and as plantings of a vineyard, and I will pour down the stones thereof into the valley, and I will discover the foundations thereof, and all the graven images thereof shall be beaten to pieces, and all the hires thereof shall be burned with the fire, and all the idols thereof will I lay desolate, for she gathered it of the hire of an harlot, and they shall return to the hire of an harlot. So notice what God's saying. He's saying break every single graven image. Now why doesn't He just say, just kill everybody that bowed down, but leave the statues? Leave the images? Leave all the pictures? No, no, no. He says break this thing in pieces. Get rid of it. Destroy the image. Break it in pieces. You should have nothing to do with it. And I'm going to prove this over and over in the Bible, but the Bible makes it clear that you're not supposed to have these type of graven images. Go to Jeremiah chapter 51. Go to Jeremiah chapter 51. And let's be honest. What's the point of having it? Look at it. Think about it. You know, when you have it, you're going to look at it. You're going to think about it. It's going to cause, you know, to have some kind of an emotional response perhaps to it, or to appreciate it more. But here's the thing. The only thing we're really supposed to have all this adoration, respect, and desire, and appreciation for is God. You're not supposed to sit here and think about all of these other elements that God has created and worship them. That's PETA, okay? PETA gets all mad when we look at a piece of meat on a plate and want to eat it. They want to worship the cow. They want to worship the dog. They want to worship the animal. They want to keep the animals alive and see how precious they are. They want to put clothes on them. Literally. I remember going down somewhere with my wife, and there's these two little rat dogs with like a little sweater vest on. And I'm thinking like, you know, what is that? It's weird. You know, God gave them a fur coat for a reason, okay? They don't need another coat on top of it. And I'm sure if they even knew what was good for them, they'd be like, get this faggoty sweater off of me, or whatever, you know? Why? You know, the dogs that are in a purse. Why would a dog want to be in a purse? You know, it makes no sense. And at the end of the day, you know, dog is only a negatively mentioned animal in the Bible. I preach those sermons on this, but why would I want to make a bunch of statues of them and put them in my house? And what does that do? It causes people to have unnatural affection towards dogs. They start thinking that dogs are more important or more valued than they really are. To the point where literally a dog will be attacking a child and someone will kill the dog and they'll get mad at you for killing the dog. Why? Because they probably have dog statues in their house. Because they probably worship dogs. Or they worship cats. Or they worship turtles. Or they worship birds or fish or whatever it is. And they get offended at those things dying because they put too much emphasis on the animal. Look, the animals are for me to eat. God said so. Okay? 1 Timothy chapter 4. And to say otherwise is the doctrine of devils. Isn't it interesting that the doctrine of devils that says not to eat animals is also similar to the fact that the animal idol in the Bible, when you sacrifice to it, it says you're sacrificing the devils. Oh, isn't that a coincidence that the same demonic spirit that says worship the graven image animal also says don't kill it and eat it. Hmm, I wonder if there's a connection there. And at the end of the day, you know, we don't need to sit here and worship animals and creatures and man and what are these. No, we need to worship God. And it makes no sense to defend the idea of having all these statues and these graven images. You know, because it just means you have an unnatural affection towards that. Towards that item. You know, towards that thing. Well, my dad made it. Well, my grandpa made it. It's a picture, you know, it's an image of my favorite kind of, you know, Boston Terrier. I don't care. You know what? It makes God angry. And at the end of the day, if it makes God angry, why would I then want to participate in such an activity? You know, God says that making these creations is the actions of someone that's foolish. Look at Jeremiah 51 and verse 17. Every man is brutish by his knowledge. Every founder is confounded by the graven image. For his molten image is falsehood and there is no breath in it. Now the context of this is for certain talking about making a false god. Okay? And I get that. You know, it's very clearly that they're making these images and believing and thinking that there is a false god associated with this particular image or anything like that. But if someone is making a graven image of a dog thinking that it's like this god or something and then they're selling it to you because you think it's cute. Even though you don't think it's a god or whatever, it's still a image of falsehood. It was still made, you know, with a horrible intention. There's nothing good about it. And notice these people that are making these things are foolish, brutish. They are basically just stupid. Verse 18. They are vanity, the work of errors. In the time of their visitation, they shall perish. What they're doing is an error. It's wrong. It has no value, no point to it. It's just completely foolish and stupid. Why would I then want to participate in a similar activity regardless of what I think about it, you know? Well, I print NIVs even though I don't use them. I mean, would that make sense? You know, we've been printing the Spanish Bibles. We decided to print some books of Mormon too. What do you think about it? Well, I think it's trash. I don't think there's anything special about it, but I make them. Because there's nothing wrong with making them. Yes, there is. It's not like, well, it's okay to make false Bibles as long as you don't believe in them. Why would it be okay? Explain to me how that makes sense. Then why would it make sense to say, like, well, I can make false images of these items, but I don't think they're really gods or anything, okay? No, just don't even make it. Just don't even have it. Don't even be in possession of it. It makes no sense. And, you know, what's interesting to me, people that are for sure into the real idolatry, they make every single one of these kinds of creations. Go to Mexico. Hey, you want to go to Mexico when you're coming back across the border? You know what they want to sell you? Graven images. And I have the literal picture to prove it, but I took pictures of these, you know, idolaters, and let me give you an example of some of the things that they have. Bulls. This is the literal bull. Deer, pigs, tigers, horses, roosters, a parrot, elephants. So the same people that are making bulls, pigs, tigers, horses, roosters are the same people that are also making, like, these death angels, babies, marries, soldiers. And some of them even make, like, Mexican gangster, you know, idols and stuff like this. Like, people that were, like, you know, some kind of special gangster or some kind of, like, special person in, like, their cult or whatever. They'll literally make sculptures and pictures of these guys. You know, some mobster or something. They'll make some kind of an idol of this guy. So, why would I say, like, you know what? I'm kind of offended by your death angel over here. Let me have the bull, you know? Like, let me get a couple of these elephants over here. You know, let me take the tiger. It's cute. No. It's coming from the same type of people, the same work of errors, it's the same foolishness, it's the same brutishness, and it's still violating the commandment of not making any graven image. There's not this clean separation from the idolaters of, well, as long as it's not the death angel, you know, as long as it's not the devil, literally, as long as it's not, you know, a Mary statue or something, then I could have it. No, it's coming from the same type of people, the same group of people. It makes no sense to have such statues and images and, you know, it's all coming from the same place of wickedness, my friend. Go if you would to chapter 10. Jeremiah chapter 10. I want to show you another verse here. Go backwards to Jeremiah chapter 10. And now I have a little bit of an article I want to get through real quickly. But let me make myself clear so that way you understand what I'm talking about. I believe that we should follow that instruction strictly, okay, that you shouldn't make any graven image or molten image. Now, the Bible describes these as being like carved works of wood or a molten image. Molten would be like you have some kind of a cast where it's basically, it's got the design. You pour in liquid, some kind of metal because it's been heated up. You heat up metal, whether it be gold, silver, doesn't matter, and you pour it into the cast, and then you let it set, and then you remove the cast, which then gives you your molten image. Or you could have a graven image. A graven image would be simply, it's some kind of piece of wood, metal, stone, something like that, and they sit there and they carve, or they literally grave over a period of time, and they create some kind of a structure within that. I believe those things are off limits, that you shouldn't be graving out of the stone, or the metal, or the casting, you know, some kind of a molten image, or the carving of some kind of wooden image, if it's meeting the criterion of Deuteronomy chapter number four, which is what? The likeness of the birds in the air, man and beast on the earth, or some kind of a fish, or some kind of a creature in the sea. Now, I'm not going to take it further than that, though. Some people might extrapolate even further than that. That's your own personal conviction. I believe the Bible is taking it to that, that's the instruction. But you know, some people will get mad at someone for having like a little soft doll or something. I don't believe that that's the graven image, or the molten image, whatsoever. I think that that's kind of silly and ridiculous, okay? So, you know, when it's coming to like toys, you know, a little plastic action figure, or some kind of a soft doll, or something like that, I don't get, you know, I don't personally believe at all that that's violating that statute or that commandment. You know, the little statutes, the little garden gnomes, your little, you know, your precious little Statue of Liberty, okay? All of that is wicked. All of that is wrong. Even if it's a bear, an owl, a fish, I don't care what it is, I believe that it's all in clear violation of the Bible, and I don't want that. You know, I don't want any of those type of things. You know, having something that's fake, I do not believe is in any way close to violating this commandment, right? So a lot of people have fake plants, like a fake tree. You know, we have a fake tree over here, you know, or you have like fake potted plants, there's all kinds. First of all, the Bible didn't say anything about plants, or trees, or any of that kind of stuff, number one. And, you know, I don't, again, would say that it has nothing to do with idolatry or graven images. All the stuff we're talking about are animals, beasts, birds, fish, everything that's shown in the Bible. You know, sometimes you can't even tell the difference between a fake plant and a real plant. I'm just being honest. Sometimes it's actually pretty good work or whatever. Now some are real obvious, okay? I'm just saying that some people decorate their house with, you know, plants and all these type of things. God decorates his house with plants and these types of things, okay? So there's nothing wrong with having some kind of a plant or whatever. But again, that's not really like graving a molten, you know, image or anything like that. Also, I don't think that it's saying that a hammer is a graven image, okay? Just so we're clear. Now, isn't a hammer, you know, a molten, you know, creation? I mean, you're going to have a cast for a hammer. They're going to pour in molten, you know, iron or whatever they're going to cast that out of, grass or something, and they're going to pour it in there and you're going to have it. Notice that a hammer doesn't look like a bird, okay? It doesn't look like a person. There's nothing wrong with having something that's a metal tool or some kind of creation or whatever. You know, an airplane. I've seen people that have airplanes in the World War II, okay, and they painted on the side of it, you know, wings. Like from a bird or something like that. Or they painted a face or something on the wing. That's not a graven image, okay? That's an airplane that has something painted on it. I'm also not saying that a picture is a graven image. Look, I believe you can draw and paint whatever you want. You can paint a cow and a dog and a bird and whatever. Now, you shouldn't probably paint Baphomet, okay? You probably shouldn't paint, like, the devil or something like that. That's weird. That's bizarre, okay? But if someone wants to go and paint, you know, some beautiful landscape or do something like that, again, I'm believing we should follow the commandments strictly. I'm not going to add to God's commandment, but I also don't want to diminish, okay? So if I'm not going to add, I'm not going to add all of my flavor of the weak things of, you know, pictures and plants and tools and toys and whatever. But I'm also not going to diminish and say, like, well, it's okay as long as you're not bound down to the thing worse than it. Now, I want to try and have the right balance of what the Bible just literally says and following God's instructions and following the spirit of the law, you know? If people are bowing down and worshiping these type of creations, I don't want to have one. I want to be like, why not have a bowl and people will bow down and worship bowls, but I don't, you know? I just want to make it clear. No one's bowing down and worshiping hammers, to my knowledge, okay? Or these type of creations or these type of structures. But, you know, even nativity scenes, you know, I don't, I'm not going to have that kind of thing, you know? And now, look, if it was like a soft doll or something like that, whatever. Okay, I'm just saying the actual graven image, it doesn't even matter if you think it's Jesus because it's not. You don't know what Jesus looks like. No one does. Now, Jeremiah chapter 10, look at verse 14. The Bible says, every man is brutish in his knowledge. Every founder is confounded by the graven image, for his molten image is falsehood and there's no breath in them. They are vanity in the work of errors. In the time of their visitation, they shall perish. Now, that sounds familiar, right? The same thing, again, just mentioned over and over and over again. Now, go to Numbers chapter 21. Numbers 21, I'm going to read a little bit of article here for you. Now, the real obvious culprit in this, you know, wicked sin is the Catholics, okay? Now, they don't like that you call them out on this, but it's just real obvious. So, I was like, well, okay, let's see what they have to say for themselves. So, I went to catholic.com and I'm not going to an anti-website, I'm going to their website called Catholic Answers, catholic.com. Can't get more Catholic than that, can you? Now, they said this, here's the title of the article, statues aren't necessarily idols, okay, by Carl Keating. And he says, here's a pop quiz I used to give in parish seminars. You recall that Israelites melted down their jewelry and made a golden calf. What was wrong with making a golden calf? He says, what's wrong with it? He says, before anyone had a chance to embarrass himself publicly, I gave the answer, absolutely nothing. What? I'm so glad I didn't go to Catholic school. I do want you to be in Numbers, go to Exodus 32 as well, okay? I want to read that, I love a few pieces here too. Absolutely nothing, okay? So, then he says, when I asked that question and gave that answer, most people were stunned. Yeah, and this is their response. But we know making the golden calf was a sin, they said. The Israelites were condemned for it. Here's his response, actually, my listeners knew no such thing. There wasn't anything at all wrong with fashioning a statue from jewelry. What was wrong was that the Israelites then proceeded to worship the non-existent God the calf represented. In other words, they committed the sin of idolatry, there never has been a sin of statue making. Okay, well let's read the chapter a little bit and see what the Bible just says, okay? Now, this is right after the Ten Commandments, essentially, and as far as a timeline, and because Moses is up talking to God for a long time, they come to Aaron and they say, you know, make us gods, right? He gives all of their jewelry and he fashions his golden calf. Look at verse 8, this is the Lord talking about them. They have turned aside quickly out of the way which I commanded them. They have made them a molten calf and have worshipped it and have sacrificed there into and said, these be thy gods, O Israel, which have brought thee up out of the land of Egypt. Now, here's the thing, in verse 8, God is saying they did something wrong. Now, would it make any sense that if God is going to then explain the things that they did wrong, that he'd bring up something that was not wrong at all? What if they said, they turned aside, they did wickedly, they gave money to the poor, and this, you'd think like, oh, giving money to the poor is bad. I mean, no matter what God said next, wouldn't you think it was bad? So what is the first thing he said? They have made them a molten calf and have worshipped it. Notice it doesn't say like, that was fine, but then they worshipped it. Can you believe that? I mean, why couldn't they just stop making the golden calf as the Catholic seminary professor wants us to believe, right? Well, let's keep reading. Verse 19. It says, and it came to pass, as soon as he came nigh unto the camp, talking about Moses, that he saw the calf and the dancing, and Moses said, well, there's no problem here. Oh, no, wait. And Moses' anger waxed hot, and he cast the tables out of his hands and break them beneath the mount. Well, all he does, he just sees the calf, and he sees them happy. Now, here's the thing. We're new independent folk battles, okay? There's technically nothing wrong with dancing, all right? But just people dancing is not a sin, and if making a golden calf is not a sin, why is he mad? He's mad because it is a sin to make the stupid golden calf, okay? The wicked image that's down there, and the fact that they're all happy about it, and they're all excited about their stupid little golden calf. And you say, well, I don't know if God was mad about them making the calf. I don't think it said that. Okay, well, look at verse 35, all right? And the Lord plagued the people because they made the calf, which Aaron made. There's nothing in the Bible that says that statue making is wrong, though. I feel like the Bible's real clear. I feel like even God's saying, I'm mad that you made the calf. He doesn't say, well, and then what you did with the calf was the only problem. No, no, no. He doesn't like anything about it. All of it's wrong, okay? Obviously, it gets worse and worse and worse and worse, and it whacks evil and more evil and everything like that. But you know what? It would be like someone saying that fornication's not wicked. It's only wicked if you do it with a really bad person. Now, obviously, maybe it's worse, but guess what? It's still wicked. Because you know what? Fornication is wicked when you love the person. I mean, Shechem loved Dinah. It was still wicked. Now, obviously, if you commit fornication, you don't even love the person. You hate the person. Wouldn't that be worse? Or wouldn't it be worse if you forced them? Isn't rape arguably way worse than consensual relationship? But guess what? Fornication is still wicked, my friend. You know, it's super weird when you have to go to the furthest extreme and say only that's wrong. Now, guess what? Let's start all the way at God's commandment, okay? Now, this is what he continues to say. But God expressly forbids making statutes, say many fundamentalists. Amen. Hey, I like this guy's viewpoint of fundamentalists. And it says, they cite Exodus 24. They cite the Bible when you cite nothing. And then he quotes, thou shall not make unto thee any graven image. And a statute is certainly a graven image, that is, an image made by human hands. When this verse is thrown at them, most Catholics are stumped for a response. Because it's that obvious. He says, if they were more familiar with Exodus, they could skip to chapter 25 and read the account of the ornamenting of the Ark of the Covenant. So this is this guy's argument, basically. He says, because in Exodus 25, 18, the Bible says for the Israelites to make cherubim upon the Ark of the Covenant, ergo, all graven images are fine then. But this is a foolish way to interpret the Bible, okay? And let me explain a similar way that someone would make that type of logic leap. When the Bible says, thou shall not kill, and then later in the Bible it says that you should put someone to death, and they say, oh, I guess actually killing is fine then. That would be the same logic as whenever it says very clearly not to make any graven image, and then God says, well, make this specific image that I told you to make, and then be like, oh, I guess all graven images are on the table again. No. That's a really weird, obviously that's an exception that the Lord told them to make a specific cherubim. Let's differentiate a few things with cherubim and make graven images. The cherubim were on the Ark of the Covenant, which was seen by one person once a year. They went in the holy place. It's not like on display for everyone to just, you know, constantly look at and worship and bow down and get all excited. It's one thing, and it's supposed to represent what actually looks like in heaven. And they're given like a special anointing of God to see exactly how to make these things. I mean, they're not just guessing. They're not just like picking out what they think it looks like. No, God's making it exactly as the representation in heaven for a very specific reason. That by no means just throws out Exodus 20 verse 4. Why would God even write that if there was no reason to say, well, there's no point. If there was no problem with making graven images, God would only have verse 5. I mean, why have verse 4? Why wouldn't He just say in verse 5, don't worship graven images? No, He also said, thou shalt not make them. And then He said, don't worship them. And obviously, they go hand in glove. Obviously, it's ketchup and French fries, my friend. But at the same time, if it says don't eat French fries and don't put ketchup on them and eat them, I'm not going to say like, oh, it's only when you put ketchup on them. You know, no, no, no, no. It's saying both. It's saying don't make it, don't worship it, okay? Now, He says in this article, the Lord commanded the ark which held the tablets of the law to be topped by, what else? Statues of two cherubim, okay? And so He says, here we have the Lord in chapter 20 saying, don't make statues according to fundamentalists. And in chapter 25, the Lord says, make statues. He says, the key to this apparent contradiction is the purpose behind the making of the statues. In chapter 20, statues used in idol worship were condemned. In chapter 25, statues used for a proper religious purpose were praised. So this is how Catholics get around their doctrine. They say, well, when we make graven images, it's to serve God. You know, when they were making graven images, it was not to serve God. So I guess any graven image that you make to serve God is on the table. But here's the problem with that. God never gives you any instructions to make graven images. He gave some people a very specific commandment. And even when they made them, it caused problems. Now, go to Numbers 21 where I had you kind of turn a little bit earlier. What would be an example of this? How about the brazen serpent? Anybody remember that one? Now, does that, oh, I guess we should all make brazen serpents and carry them around with us. And in fact, there's a picture of Jesus. Why don't we all have brazen serpent stats that we use out so many? And say, look and live. That's stupid, my friend. It's bizarre, okay? It's weird. And in fact, it caused problems for the children of Israel. But look at Numbers 21, verse number 6. The Bible says, and the Lord sent fiery serpents among the people, and they bit the people, and much people of Israel died. Therefore, the people came to Moses and said, we have sinned, for we have spoken against the Lord and against thee. Pray unto the Lord that he may take away the serpents from us, and Moses prayed for the people. And the Lord said unto Moses, make thee a fiery serpent and set it upon a pole, and it shall come to pass that everyone that is bitten, when he looketh upon it, shall live. Moses made a serpent of brass and put it upon a pole, and it came to pass that if a serpent had bitten any man when he held the serpent of brass, he lived. We have a story in the Bible where God clearly instructs Moses to make a very specific animal on a very specific, you know, creation. And it has a special purpose to heal the people of the bite of the serpent. Now obviously, anybody that knows anything about the gospel realizes this is all symbolic, right? It's symbolic of the serpent bite is a picture of sin entering the world through the deception of the devil who is that serpent, okay? And the only way to be cured by that serpent is to have that serpent bite but put on Jesus Christ, which is why there's a serpent on the stick, which pictures Jesus Christ taking our sin for us, and the only requirement of salvation, look and live. All you have to do is believe that's going to heal you, and you just look to Jesus, and you're healed. Picturing faith alone, picturing no works, you know, it's a great symbol of faith. That's why God included it, okay? But at the end of the day, this was not a great idea of like, oh, let's just start making brazen serpents. Let's just start making graven images of snakes and whatever. You know, people that have these kind of images are wicked and evil type people, demonic type people that have, you know, it makes me think of Hinduism. Hinduism has a lot of graven images, and a lot of those deal with snakes and serpents and dragons, you know. You got a lot of this in China, a lot of dragons and sea serpents and snakes and whatever. None of those people love the Lord. None of those, I mean, show me the godly, sold-out Christian that just got tons of brazen and golden serpents. Okay, that doesn't exist, my friend. It makes no sense to have such creations. And if you go to 2 Kings, go to 2 Kings chapter 18. Let's get a little more clarity on this particular image that was created, this raven structure. 2 Kings chapter 18, look at verse number 1. Now, in 2 Kings chapter number 18, we're talking about Hezekiah. It says in verse 1, Now it came to pass on the third year of Hoshea, the son of Elah king of Israel, that Hezekiah, the son of Ahaz, king of Judah, began to reign. Twenty-five years old was he when he began to reign, and he reigned twenty and nine years in Jerusalem. His mother's name also was Abi, the daughter of Zechariah. That's a good name for a daughter. Verse 3. And he did that which was right in the sight of the Lord, according to all that David his father did. Now, whatever we read next, let me help you with the context. It's right in the sight of the Lord. Okay, isn't that real clear? Let's read the next verse. He removed the high places, and break the images, and cut down the groves, and break in pieces the brazen serpent that Moses had made. For unto those days the children of Israel did burn incense to it, and he called it in a hushed hand. And notice it says that he did that which was right by destroying the images, specifically even the brazen serpent. And notice it had started causing problems for the children of Israel. So, even if you could argue and say, well, I made this statue to serve God. Well, look what happens eventually. People start corrupting themselves, and worshipping, and it becomes a problem, and it becomes a snare. Even Gideon did the same thing. He created this golden image, or this golden, the word's escaping me also. Go to Judges 8 for a second. Ephod, yeah, you're right. The golden ephod, and it became a snare unto him. You don't have to turn there. I want to keep reading a little bit of this article. He says this. He says, we can't blame, I'm sorry, this brings us to statues in Catholic churches, okay. Fundamentalists see us kneel for statues of Mary and the saints, and conclude we're worshipping either the statues as such, or at least the saints represented by the statues. Can't blame them entirely for this misconception. Okay, sometimes this misconception is fostered by our side. So, he says, we notice them bowing down to literal pictures or images, not pictures, graven images of Mary, graven statues of saints, and we somehow think there's something wrong with that. Yes, absolutely, okay. And then he says, sometimes we're to blame. Now, he gives this long story, he gives a story about how there was this Catholic wedding, and the priest literally said, quote, we Catholics worship Mary, end quote, okay. And he's like, oh, sometimes, you know, priests get up there and they say that, but they don't mean what, you know, is bad. You know, they don't mean anything bad by that. They mean a good form of worshipping Mary, not a bad form of worshipping Mary. Well, let me help you out. There is no good worshipping of Mary. And if you understood the word worship in your Bible, it's pretty much equivalent bowing down. That's really what it means in the Bible. So, it's really foolish to try and make all these delineations. Now, worship's a little bit broader word than that. It can mean other things. And when we say we come to worship the Lord at church, we're not always talking about bowing down, okay. But most of the time in the Bible, the word worship specifically means to bow down. Go to Genesis 24, that's where I want you to go, Genesis 24. And I want to prove this real quick. Genesis chapter 24, look at verse 52. The Bible says, and it came to pass that when Abraham's servant heard their words, he worshiped the Lord bowing himself to the earth. So, notice how he worshiped the Lord by bowing himself to the earth. That's actually what the word worship is meaning here. Go to Psalms 95, Psalms 95. I just want to give you a couple of places where I believe the Bible just defines for you what worship even means. Psalms 95, right there in the middle of your Bible, look at verse number 6. The Bible says, O come, let us worship and bow down, let us kneel before the Lord our maker. So, now it gives you like three words, right? Worship, bow down, kneel as three kind of synonyms helping you understand what even worship means. Now, go to Acts chapter number 10, Acts chapter number 10. Here's the question, is it acceptable to worship or aka bow down to anyone other than the Lord? No. There is no such application or acceptable practice. And in fact, that's what the whole book of Esther is predicated on. I mean, the whole problem in the book of Esther is the fact that Mordecai refuses to bow down and reverence Haman. And Haman really hates it. I mean, this is the main emphasis of Daniel with Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, how they don't want to bow down and worship the graven image. They don't want to even kneel to such a structure. And we find in the Bible some places where people are going to bow down to a human. They're going to bow down to a person. And then we get their response, okay? Let's see if it's ever okay. Acts chapter 10, look at verse 25. And as Peter was coming in, Cornelius met him and fell down at his feet, notice this, and worshiped him. But Peter took him up saying, stand up. I myself also am a man. So notice, does Peter allow anybody to fall down and worship him? And here's the thing, of all the people in the Bible that we could possibly hope for to condemn bowing down in the Catholic church, you know who I think is a great one? Peter. I mean, if you're not allowed to bow down to Peter, then why would you bow down to Saint Thomas or to Saint so-and-so? I mean, Saint Peter, of all the men that you could possibly bow down to and all the saint culture of the Catholic church, how about Saint Peter? And when Peter was alive, he said, stand up, because it's wicked to bow down to a man and worship a man. You know, that's not what the Bible teaches. Now, go if you would to 1 Kings chapter 19. Go to 1 Kings chapter 19. You see this in the New Testament, in the book of Revelation. People are kind of bowing down to the angel, and he's like, stand up, dude. I'm of your brethren. You know, worship God. You know, we see the devil tempting Jesus Christ in the wilderness, asking him to what? Fall down, bow down, and worship him. And he's like, I'm not going to do that but for the Lord. We're only supposed to worship the Lord. You know, I'm not going to sit here and bow down and reverence any other person. 1 Kings chapter 19. Look at verse number 18. Now, notice how God describes the men he wants to preserve as people that didn't do something. They never bowed. Why? Because it's wicked to bow down to false God. It's wicked to bow down to these other religions. So then why would I want to get a golden calf or a statue of Mary or a statue of Saint Aquinas or whatever you want to call him and bow down to it? No, it's wicked. It's wrong. There's nothing biblical about it. It's not godly. You know, it's idolatry. Now, he says, you know, this is their way that they kind of explain this. He says, is there anything wrong with honoring the living? Not at all. So then he just switches words and just says honor. Well, of course there's nothing wrong with honoring people. The Bible says honor the king, right? The Bible says to honor the brotherhood. You know, love the brotherhood. You're not supposed to honor one another. We're supposed to prefer one another. You know, giving people respect. But there's a difference between honoring someone and bowing down to them. There's a huge difference between those two things. And if you don't understand that, you need to read your Bible a couple of times and you'll see that the worshiping is in coordination to bowing down. And he just kind of goes, he blabbers on about honoring people, honoring people that are alive and honoring people that are dead, you know. And the Bible says, you know, that we should ask one another to pray for one another. It's like, well, if I'm supposed to ask my brother and sister to Christ to pray for me, why wouldn't I ask, you know, Mary? Or why wouldn't I ask Peter? Or why wouldn't I ask? Well, first of all, you never see that in the Bible. Like, you know, it's not like we're the first group of people on the earth that had dead saints before us, you know. If that's true, then why did Peter not ask Isaac and Jacob to pray for him and Abraham to pray for him? You know, and all these other saints. I mean, why not Abraham? Why not Moses himself? I mean, why wouldn't I ask? You know, it's silly. But here's the thing. When I ask one of my church members to pray, you know what they're doing? They're praying to Jesus. They're praying to the Lord for me. And so it's two people both asking Jesus. Okay. It makes no sense to ask. I mean, the people in heaven, they're all on our side anyways. Okay. There's nothing in the Bible saying to ask dead saints to pray for you. It's just, they're basically just trying to wiggle out of the fact that they just want to worship a false goddess called Mary. Go to Revelation 12. Go to Revelation chapter number 12 in your Bible. It says the fact that a Catholic kneels before a statue to pray doesn't mean he's praying to the statue. Okay. But you know what's weird about that statement? Is they just admit that they pray to Mary. So if they're saying, I kneel in front of Mary and I pray to Mary, but when I'm kneeling, I'm not necessarily praying to her. Yes, you are. Okay. It's stupid. These articles, it's like, you know, how can anybody believe this or how can you read this and feel like these people are sincere? He says, a fundamentalist may kneel with a Bible in his hand, but no one thinks he's praying to a book. Sure. But you know what? I never said that I'm praying to a book. They literally say they pray to Mary on the same website. Here's a title of article. Why pray to Mary? So, you know, you know what I don't have on my website. Why pray to the Bible? You know, and you know, when I pray, I don't like. I don't like put a Bible up and I'm like, oh, you know, like, I mean, I'm not like thinking that there's something special about these pages or this like binding or whatever this type font or anything like that. It's just a Bible, my friend. You know what? There's nothing wrong with owning a Bible. Nothing wrong with touching a Bible or looking at a Bible or decorating with a Bible. In fact, that's a great way to decorate. You know what would be wrong is when God literally says, don't make a graven image and you decorate with that. And you have a little Mary shrine in your house like Catholics literally do and they're bowing down and worshipping it. Now, this article called Why pray to Mary from the same website says this, Jesus has given us his blessed mother as our great spiritual mother and a heavenly advocate who intercedes for us. And then this is their proof text, Revelation 12, 17. Okay, let's read that. And the dragon was wroth with the woman and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God and have the testimony of Jesus Christ. So this is the doctrine they got from that verse. Jesus has given us his blessed mother as our great spiritual mother, a heavenly advocate who intercedes for us. Now I understand why they do weird crap is they just, they can't even understand the Bible at all. I mean, that's just a complete, just like bizarre interpretation of the Bible. It has nothing to do with the Bible, my friend. Okay. Oh, they say, well, the prayer of righteous man availeth much. Okay. But at the end of the day, you know, we never see the example of anybody praying to anyone that's not alive. Like I'm saying, asking for prayer, saying like, Hey, will you pray for me or the, you know, the prayers of the saints to send up into heaven. I don't see the incense or the smoke of the prayers of the people that are already in heaven. Okay. It's the people that are alive on earth. And in fact, these, the asses makes it clear that there's none of this stuff matters after we're dead. You know, when we're in the grave, we're just up with the Lord, you know, our works are done. Our works have ceased. You know, it's not like you're getting extra brownie points for praying when you're in heaven. Okay. And it's hard to have faith when you literally see Jesus. Okay. You know, there's not really much faith left anymore. God, when he talks about prayer, he talks it in coordination with faith because it doesn't take faith to pray to the Lord when you can't see him. It doesn't take a lot of faith to ask the Lord something when you see him. Let me give you evidence of this. The devil is in heaven, in your Bible and ask the Lord stuffs. Go to Job, in the book of Job, the devil's standing there talking to the Lord, asking him things and talking with him. That's not special. That's in the sense that, like, he's getting brownie points or something like that. You know, it's not faith that it took for the devil to do that. He could see the Lord right there. The devil's asked things of Jesus Christ on this earth. Okay. You know, it takes faith. It's not seeing Jesus and just praying by faith. Go to 1 Samuel 15, and I want to go to two more places. Okay. There's a lot we could talk about in this chapter and in these places of the Scripture, but, you know, the points that I want to make is this. Raven images should be off limits regardless if you're going to worship it. Okay. And so I just want to decorate my house with it. I don't want to, you know, try to give it any kind of attention that it doesn't deserve. And the Bible likens idolatry specifically to another word in 1 Samuel. So I want to kind of point this out and give you a little bit more application. But it says in 1 Samuel, chapter number 15, look at verse 23. For rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft, and stubbornness is as iniquity and idolatry, because thou has rejected the word of the Lord, he hath also rejected thee from being king. Now, this is a great passage to help us understand this article. This guy just simply rejects the word of God. I mean, pretty much the only word of God he quoted in here is literally, thou should not make unto thee any graven image. Think about that. Like you have an entire article talking about why you should have graven images. You quote one verse from the Bible. One verse. Oh, no, sorry, it's two. Honor thy father, thy mother. Okay. There's your two verses. And you literally do the exact opposite of it. It's just you're basically saying, like, I don't really care what the Bible says. And in this context of 1 Samuel, chapter 15, the Lord told Samuel to kill, or Saul, I'm sorry, not Samuel, Saul. He told Saul to kill Agag, and he just refuses to do it. He won't do it. Well, and he refuses to what? Kill the animals. Oh, they're going to make them sacrifices or whatever. What did he do? He just rejected the word of God. He didn't just do exactly what God said. He had a better idea, a better plan. He thought, no, I'll use this in sacrifice to the Lord. We'll use living animals that are really nice. We'll sacrifice to the Lord. Isn't that the same logic as saying, like, oh, no, no, this graven image isn't for the devil. This graven image is for the Lord, and we'll serve the Lord with it. But what are you doing? You're rejecting the word of God. And you're stubborn. It's a stubbornness that's associated with it. Because a lot of people are raised in false religion, and then when confronted with the Bible, and it's real clear, what do they do? They dig in, showing their stubbornness. They prefer the graven image over the word of God. Instead of liking what the Bible says, they like their tradition. And look, anybody who's going to be stubborn, it's the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church has a policy that they can never change their doctrine. I mean, once the priest speaks ex cathedra, and they give their little doctrine, they can't change that. Like, it's just locked in. This is a bad idea. If you realize that the Bible is saying something different than what you believe, you should update the doctrinal statement. You should update your beliefs. You should say, hey, we're not going to have the graven images anymore. It doesn't matter how many generations it's passed down. It doesn't matter how many colors of decoration are on your little Mary statue. You break it in pieces, you destroy it, and you get rid of it. And is it really any coincidence that the church that is filled with graven images today is the same church that has a false gospel? Show me the Baptist church that's filled with graven images. Show me the church that really loves the Lord, that's really messed up on all these graven images. It just doesn't exist. You know, if there is Christian churches out there that have a bunch of these graven images, I bet they're wrong on other stuff, too, because it just brings in that stubborn attitude of just saying, well, I want to have it. I want to have my little, you know, precious moments, or I want to have my little special ornaments, or I want to have these little pictures of these animals and dogs. Look, you and I both know the people that have these type of images have an unhealthy affection towards whatever that image is, whether it be a man or a woman. Look, the cultures that have a bunch of women statues all over are filled with feminism. The little Diana statues or whatever they're going to have, their culture is just succumbing to women. You know, it doesn't help the Mexican culture that they have a bunch of Mary statues. They're going to be infested with feminism and worshipping women and worshipping goddesses and whatever. You know, or you look at the Roman culture, what do they have? Statues of naked dudes. Have you ever heard of David? They have literal statues of David and all these men, and they're always naked. It's gross. What could be more disgusting than decorating your house with naked men? That's the worst, okay? You show me graven images and a good example. There isn't any. It's always associated with wickedness, weirdness, perversion, filth, smut, and really it's just a manifestation of what's in their heart. You're a feminist? Mary statue. You're a faggot? Naked David statue, right? You worship animals? Calves and, you know, whatever animal or whatever. You know, you have an unhealthy affection towards dogs? Dog statues, cat statues, tiger statues, you know, birds or fish or whatever. You know, where should your affections be on the word of God, my friend? Go to Deuteronomy chapter 6. This is the last place I'll have you turn. Deuteronomy chapter number 6. Do you need to smash in pieces all of the statues in this world? You know what? I have this other document. I'm going to go through all of it. In the last year, there has been hundreds and hundreds of statues being smashed in America. And you know what? You know who's been crying about it? Republicans. Republicans and MAGA. And you know what I say? Amen. I hope you destroy and smash every single statue. Abraham Lincoln, smash it! George Washington, smash it! In this article, and I mean I couldn't even believe, I didn't know there was this many. I mean this is all like 2020 and 2021. I mean it's just pages after pages of all the statues that are being smashed in America. And it's people like Robert E. Lee. And I kind of just circled a few of the names. A statue of Sam Davis. A statue of Jefferson Davis, the Episcopalian who's rotting in hell. Robert E. Lee. Albert Pike. Who would not want that destroyed? Like literal Satanists and like Freemason. He was a leader in the Ku Klux Klan. George Davis. The list just goes on and on. A bunch of people I don't care about. No one cares about. John Pelham. Stonewall Jackson. More Robert E. Lee. Just name after name. Look, it's unhealthy. Here's one. Father Serra. Okay, and it's spelled S-E-R-R-A. Father Serra. He was a famous Catholic who's also burning in hell. And here's another problem. The name Father. Which Jesus said, call no man Father. Isn't it interesting that the same Bible that says call no man Father. The Catholics call him Father. The same Bible that says don't make any graven images. They're making graven images. The same Bible that says faith alone, they say works. I mean, it's not a rocket scientist to realize it's wrong. Okay. Now there's Father Serra, you know who he's famous for? Baptizing Native Americans to enable them to get saved. He didn't help anybody. He didn't benefit anybody. Why would I want to honor him? Why would I want to bow down or look at that bill? Theodore Roosevelt, knock it down. Abraham Lincoln, knock it down. Oh, you're tearing down history. Look, most of these people aren't even saved, number one. And number two, when we read throughout the Bible, anytime God found these statues, he said break them down. Knock them down. Break them in pieces. You know, here's a wicked image that someone made. Someone made a literal graven image of Jack Hyles and his wife. And put it right in front of their Bible college. Now, I don't believe it was in his lifetime. I think it was, if I understood this story correctly, people made this afterwards. But that's stupid. That's foolish. Just like Peter, it'd be like, no, stand up, I'm a man. Don't make a graven image of someone, you know? Even if it's the right person. Even if it's Jesus. You don't even know what Jesus looks like. You know, what you should decorate with is the word of God. That's what the Bible literally, clearly, plainly teaches. Deuteronomy chapter number six, let's look at verse number four. Hear, O Israel, the Lord our God is one Lord. Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. And these words which I command thee this day shall be in thine heart. Thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes, and thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house and on thy gates. But notice what God wants us to just emphasize in our lives. Is it dogs? No, it's beware of dogs. Is it dragons? No. You know, that dragon's going into hell. What God wants you to do is put John 3.16 on the wall. What God wants you to do is put Exodus 24 on the wall, not a graven image. You know, some people would be offended at that verse being on the wall. You know what? I'm more offended by putting the graven image on the wall. You know, you should decorate with the word of God. And notice how God wants you to think every single moment. I mean, when you're walking, when you're sitting, when you're lying down, and when you're rising up. Now, when's another time? Because either you're sitting, standing, rising, or laying down. I mean, that's just life. He doesn't want you thinking about all the other stuff, and worshipping the other stuff, and giving too much emphasis and attention to the other stuff. This is all of the attention and focus that we should be having. It's right here. And look, the point of having these images is to decorate so that you can look at it, adore it, pay attention to it, think about it. It's a reminder. But the reminder should be this. And, you know, don't be like a Jew and just paste this on the door. Or people can't even, you know. It's talking about the actual words, you know. Not this little scroll that no one could ever read that has no benefit or whatever. That's just a virtue signaling of how godly you are. No, it's saying like actually putting the word of God where it's visible and people could read it. You know, people could actually put it to use or could appreciate the word of God. Not just, you know, it's not saying get a bunch of these and just get some nails and just be like, all right, bam! Anybody got another one? Bam! You just have a bunch of Bible covers on the wall. Okay, that's not cool. It's like saying put a verse upon the wall. It's saying the word of God. And it's also not saying like tie this to your arm and tie this to your forehead. No, it's saying like put it in your head, hold a Bible. It's saying put it in your head, memorize, meditate on the word of God. And that's what we need to bring back is the meditation on God's word. Break all the graven images and the statues in America and bring back the word of God on the walls. Bring back the Ten Commandments on the walls. Like Exodus chapter 20 verse 4. Let's close in prayer. Thank you Heavenly Father for such clear commandments and instructions. Pray that we wouldn't have stubbornness in our heart and that we would actually desire to please you. And instead of decorating our house with cheap imitations of statues and images and these things that you consider an abomination. Rather we would praise the word of God. That we would love the word of God. That we would try to decorate our houses and our lives with the word of God rather than cheap substitutes. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. Amen. Let's go ahead and sing one more song. Hopefully everybody has the white handout. If you don't have one, raise up your hand and one of the ushers will try and bring one to you. We should have a bunch. Give a second just to make sure everybody gets one. It's going to be Oh Holy Night. Got a new song for you tonight but hopefully it's not new to you. A very famous Christmas song. Give it another second so the ushers can get those to everybody. You still need one. Raise up your hand that way they know to get you. Alright let's sing Oh Holy Night. Start together on the first. Oh Holy Night, the stars are brightly shining. It is the night of the dear Savior's birth. All lay the world in sin and ever-finding. Till He appeared and the soul felt His birth. Until of hope the weary world rejoices. Pray on earth praise the new and glorious Lord. What are your fears? Oh hear the angel voices. O night divine, O night when Christ was born. O night, O night divine, O night divine. Led by the light of faith so meanly beaming. With glowing hearts by His cradle we stand. Over the world a star is sweetly gleaming. Now came the wise when the glory of heaven. The King of kings laid us in lowly danger. In all our trials, born to be our friend. He knows our need, our weakness is no stranger. We hold Your King, we hold Him only then. We hold Your King, we hold Him only then. Truly He taught us love for one another. His love is love and His gospel is peace. Chains He shall break, the servant is our brother. And in His name all oppression shall cease. Sweet hymns of joy in grateful forest raise we. With all our hearts we praise His holy name. Christ is the Lord. O praise His name forever, His power and glory evermore. The Lord proclaim His love and glory evermore proclaim. Amen. Great singing everybody. You are dismissed. God bless you.