In this sermon, the preacher emphasizes the unpredictability and troubles of the world we live in, but also highlights the hope of a future where everything will be set right. The message is a call to watchfulness and vigilance until that day comes. The preacher refers to a previous message by Brother Dwayne, who called for purposeful living and making decisive choices for the kingdom. The sermon then focuses on the story of Jehoshaphat in the Old Testament, who faced a great multitude coming against him. Jehoshaphat sought the Lord, proclaimed a fast, and prayed for God's judgment and guidance. A prophet then assured him that they would not need to fight, but to position themselves, stand still, and see the salvation of the Lord. The next day, they sent out singers ahead of the army, and God gave them victory. The preacher intended to discuss the consequences of compromise by looking at three men in the Old Testament who made small compromises and how it affected them. However, the sermon lacks a conclusion and a New Testament passage to encourage the listeners not to compromise. The preacher also mentions the sensuality and wickedness of the world today, but suggests that God has not destroyed it yet because there are still righteous people carrying out His purposes.

We're asking each of you the grace and peace of Jesus, our Savior. If you're a little bit like I am, it's possible that the weather can affect us by, well, some have struggles with allergies. The heat has a way of perhaps working with our physical energies, and the storm the other night has a way of perhaps affecting us as well. And all of this together is possible for the heat, the weather, everything combined is possible for us to be affected in our inner man, let's say, by the lethargy that might settle in because of the heat in our physical bodies. It's possible for that same lethargy to settle into our spirits. And I felt a little bit of that this morning for myself, but I've been blessed in coming together with God's people who have put forth the energy and the effort to come together because we know it's the thing to do. And we know that we're exhorted that we shouldn't neglect the assembling of ourselves together because we're in the last days. So I'm very thankful to be able to have a place of refuge, to come together, to be re-energized in my spirit. And I felt a new energy flowing in from the brothers and sisters through Christ, from Christ, through the brothers and sisters in our fellowship here. And I praise God for that. There are a lot of things wrong with the world, as we know, if we open our eyes and see. And I was thinking about the fact that there will one day, as Revelation 21 tells us, there'll be a new heaven and a new earth for the first heaven and the first earth will have passed away and there will be no more sea. And John says that I saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And he heard a loud voice from heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men and he will dwell with them and they shall be his people. God himself will be with them and be their God and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes and there shall be no more death, no sorrow, no crying, no more pain for the former things have all passed away. And we look forward to that day, don't we? We live in a world when there's so much wrong going on all around us and even the elements, the the wind, the the the forces of nature sometimes seem out of control. And we know that God is in control, but in this world of trouble, in a world that is groaning and travailing, waiting until the revelation of the sons of God happens, as it says there in Romans chapter eight, in this world of trouble, things are unpredictable. But we look forward to a day when everything will be set right. And so the message today is perhaps a call to watchfulness and vigilance until that day comes. And I suppose the message that I have on my heart this morning really goes back to Brother Duane's message last Sunday. I'd encourage us to go back and listen to that if we have a chance. Brother Duane called us to making purposeful choices. He called us out of a passive kind of living toward purposeful living where we are decisive in our choices for the kingdom. And yeah, I really think I've been thinking a lot about that message this past weekend. The message today sort of comes out of that. And it is a message what I have to say today, I think lacks a conclusion and it's a bit one sided. And my intent was to bring some examples from the Old Testament and at the end, bring some passage from the New Testament that will help us not do what these men did in the Old Testament. And the subject this morning is compromise. The title is No Compromise. And I wanted to take a look at three men in the Old Testament who made small compromises and how those compromises eventually affected them. And then I was going to go to the New Testament and encourage us not to compromise. Well, as the preparation came together, it seemed that the focus is primarily on the Old Testament. And I realized it would take part two in another message to to bring the exhortation on how we can avoid compromise. So it'll be a one sided and I suppose it will. My desire is that the lack of conclusion would be would provoke us to think about how to avoid compromise. So at the end, I hope we can open it up and perhaps as we're listening today to the Spirit of God, we can be taught together how to avoid compromise. So I want to begin with a couple of questions. Do you think that it's safer to be a Christian today here in America than it would have been being a Christian in a communist Russia under the persecution back in the Iron Curtain days, which is safer here now or there then? Another question, some of us are from a background, many of us are from a background where our forefathers back in Europe in the 1500s were persecuted for their faith. Thousands of them died torturing through the torture, the suffering. They were drowned. They were burnt at the stake. They were they were murdered. Is it safer for us today as Anabaptists here in America? Or would it have been safer to live as an Anabaptist back then? What do you think? It depends what we mean by safe. Yes, that's a good response there. OK, what we mean by safe is how would define that? I mean, safe as in in being preserved to the kingdom. Safe as in being on fire for God. If we define safety in that way, I sincerely believe that we live in a time that is far more dangerous for the people of God than back then in the 1500s when our forefathers were being slaughtered for their faith. And I've talked with a German pastor who remembers the Iron Curtain days, and he he says that his churches were a lot purer and a lot more on fire for God under the Iron Curtain than what they are today in the free West. And so I think we're in a day in a day we're living in an age when there is great pressure to compromise and that presents a great danger to us. And so this is a call for watchfulness, for vigilance. One of the meanings of compromise, compromise means when compromise happens, it's when two parties come together and they make mutual concessions that allows them to settle their differences. Two parties make concessions and they get their differences hammered out so that they can have peace together. Now, I am all for making peace. I love peace. I don't like conflict, but there are some things that you shouldn't make peace about. We cannot make peace with some things. There are some things we cannot make concessions on, some things we cannot make settlements with. And so we're called to live without compromise in a compromised world. I remember the story of the Titanic. There was a there was a small compromise that took place in the construction of the Titanic that probably led to the sinking of that ship. When they put those plates together that comprised the outer hull of that great ship, they spliced those steel plates with rivets, a relatively small part in that massive ship. But the research shows today with they've recovered some of those rivets from the wreck at the bottom of the ocean and they've analyzed those rivets. And the speculation is that the ship builder in Belfast, Ireland, which built this great ship, they were they were under pressure with many orders for ships. And so they compromised a little bit on the quality of these rivets and they used a lower grade of steel than should have been used. And so they put those rivets in. And when when the Titanic brushed that iceberg, some of those rivets snapped and the plates buckled some in some places. And we know the rest of the story. The water came in, the ship sank. If those rivets, those relatively small parts in the ship had not been compromised, it's very likely that the Titanic would have survived its brush with that iceberg. So I want to look at three Old Testament examples where men made compromises, relatively small compromises, which eventually led to shipwreck for them and their families. And I want to look at three major areas of compromise that we're faced with today. Three, three areas that we're we're faced with the danger of compromise. The first and perhaps the most serious would be the temptation to compromise with the flesh and symbolized by King Saul. And then we're confronted with compromise with the world. And perhaps we could look at Lot for an example of that. And then there is the compromise through ungodly alliances. And that we could look at for that one. We could look at Jehoshaphat, good King Jehoshaphat. So let's start with King Saul and his compromise with Amalek. And we're using Amalek as a symbol of the struggle against sin in the flesh because the Amalekites were a source of a constant struggle for the Israelites. We remember right after the Israelites left Egypt as they were journeying toward the promised land, it was the Amalekites who came out of the hills and they attacked Israel and they attacked Israel from the rear. It was a despicable thing to do. And they were probably going after the probably the weak and perhaps the elderly, maybe the little children who would have been protected more at the rear. But they did the unconventional thing. They attacked the Israelites from the rear. And it was on that day, remember, that Joshua or Moses lifted up his hands and finally the victory was won over the Amalekites. And it would be a symbol of sin. Sin is like that, isn't it? Right as we enter the Christian walk, sin wants to attack us. Where we are, the most vulnerable sin wants to come, harasses us and wants to bring us down. But the Amalekites harassed Israel for most of their history, it seems it was much later, we remember in Israel's history after the captivity to Babylon, it was. The book of Esther tells us an Agagite, he would have been an Amalekite, you may remember his name, the man who wanted to totally eradicate the Jewish race at that time, what was his name? Haman, Haman was probably an Amalekite and he had this design to wipe Israel off the face of the earth. He wanted to do that. And of course, God intervened there through Esther and his plan was was thwarted. But sin is like that, too, isn't it? It would like to it would like to destroy us. But in between the beginnings of Israel's history and at that time in Israel's history, we have the Amalekites, they're sort of popping up all over the place throughout Israel's history, and they're always harassing and making life difficult for Israel. Like the time that David came back to Ziklag and the city was burnt with fire. It was the Amalekites who had done that. So now we come to our first Samuel, chapter 15. Let's turn there. We'll be going to a number of scriptures today in the Old Testament. First, Samuel, chapter 15. And the word of the Lord came to Saul. And we know this story well, I'm just going to read three verses of it here at the beginning of first Samuel 15. Samuel also says to Saul, the Lord sent me to anoint you king over his people, over Israel. Now, therefore, heed the voice of the words of the Lord. Thus says the Lord of hosts, I will punish Amalek for what he did to Israel, how he ambushed him on the way when he came up from Egypt. Now go and attack Amalek and utterly destroy all that they have and do not spare them, but kill both men and women, infant and nursing child, oxen, sheep, camel and donkey. We know the rest of that story. We know how Saul very nearly carried out God's command completely, very nearly he did. But he made a small compromise. He kept one man alive and a few of the best animals. And then we know how Samuel confronted Saul and Saul tried to rationalize things and put a good spin on things. You know, he said, I have performed the commandment of the Lord. I have taken care of all the people, but I save the king. And it was the people who insisted on keeping some of the best animals. And they do have good intentions. They're going to sacrifice these animals to the Lord at Gilgal. It's a very good rationality there. But we know Samuel's rebuke to Saul and to Saul, it seemed as though his disobedience was just a small compromise. But it cost Saul dearly. What did it what did that compromise cost Saul? We know that it costs him his reign. It caused God to reject him for being king. It caused it caused Saul's kingdom to be torn away from him. It caused the death of Saul's sons. It eventually cost Saul his own life. It's very possible that Saul's life ended at the hands of the people with whom Saul had compromised. This is the terrible irony in this whole thing. And perhaps you've heard me say this before. And I apologize if if you well, I guess I don't apologize. I'll say it again. But you remember how that at the end of Saul's life. When he was being pursued by the enemy and the archers had hit him, it's pretty graphic there at the end of first Samuel, the archers had hit Saul, he was dying and he begged his armor bearer to slay him. But his armor bearers terrified he's not going to touch the king and he refuses to finish off Saul. And so Saul takes his own spear or his sword, I'm not sure which, and he falls upon it in an effort at suicide. Horrible way. Well, then there was still apparently life in him at that point. If we go by the story of the young man who came to David, remember that story at the beginning of second Samuel, young man came to David three days later with the head of Saul in his hand. And he presented that to David, expecting to get a reward. And here he told his story. He told David and his men, I came upon Saul back there on the battlefield and Saul was leaning on his spear and he begged me to kill him. And so I did. And here is his head and I am an Amalekite, he said. Here was a young man and I sort of believe you can put that all together and I believe it makes sense. That's my own understanding of that. But here's the terrible irony is that the people with which Saul had compromised, it came back and got him at the end, finished him off. And if we see Amalek as a type of sin in the flesh, we know that if we compromise with sin in the flesh, it will come back in the end and will cause our destruction. And here's where no compromise, we cannot compromise with our flesh, we cannot compromise with sin. It will cost us dearly in the end. And we'll go to Romans chapter eight, verses 12 and 13. Romans 8, 12 and 13, let's read there what Paul talked, what Paul says about the flesh. And here we want to define flesh as we're not talking about our physical bodies per se, but we're talking about the wrong desires that might that tend to reside in our minds and in our bodies, the wrong kinds of desires. Here it says, therefore, brother, we are debtors, not to the flesh to live according to the flesh. For if you live according to the flesh, you will die. But if by the spirit you put to death the deeds of the body, you will live. You know, Paul is very clear here and he's talking not to the unbeliever, but he's talking to the brethren. And there is a teaching out there that says that after you are born again, you cannot lose eternal life. I think that the original lie of Satan is still around when Satan said to the Adam and Eve, you will not surely die. But here the teaching is very clear, it's to brethren. And Paul says to the brethren that if you live after the flesh, you will die very clear. And so the temptation today and there's all around us and the pressure is on the pressure is on in every way comes in from the culture around us to compromise with the flesh, with wrong desires. And brothers and sisters, I say to all of us, first of all, with me to compromise with the flesh leads in one direction, it always leads to death. And my my exhortation and my encouragement and my plea with all of us here today, if there's anyone here with a hidden struggle and you know that there is an area in your life that has been compromised by the flesh, by sin, please do something about that. It's leading it's leading us. It would lead us in one direction. It would lead us toward death. Please bring it out to someone, bring it into the light and have someone help you bring it to God. And you can go to God directly, but it always is helpful to have someone share it with you. There's many struggles that we face, struggles of the flesh, I know, and it would be helpful, I think, if we could maybe as you have opportunity, just take a look at Galatians chapter five and those that list of the sins of the flesh and be honest enough to examine ourselves in the light of those things. Are any of those things causing any kind of compromise in my life? If we hear from the spirit of God that compromise is going on in any of those lusts of the flesh and brothers and sisters, the call is for us to deal with that thing decisively before it gets us in the end. No compromise here in the area of the flesh. Now, a second area of great danger is compromise with the world. And we could go to a lot for an example of a man who had a who made compromise with the world. And I won't really turn to the scripture there in Genesis. We know that story well, how that lot it says after he parted from Abraham, what did he do with his tent? He pitched it towards Sodom. Now, I'm not sure what all that means, but it seems to me that there was an inclination in the lot toward that wicked city. And he set up his household in the direction of Sodom and raised his family there, apparently right in the shadow of one of the wickedest cities you could imagine. And maybe a lot had the idea that he could do some mission work there. I don't know. But, you know, this this small compromise of just pitching his tent towards Sodom, it led to the destruction of this man's family. And we know that in the New Testament, the book of Peter calls Lot a righteous man. And he himself somehow was saved, but he lost everything. It was a tragic story. What a lot of tragedy and what what regret he must have had at the end of his life. And we know the story, what happened some years later, he'd lived there a while. He was apparently one of the elders of the city as because he sat in the city gate there. He apparently had worked himself up to some position of responsibility. And then the angels came that evening and the angels came to Lot's house. And then the men of the city, the wicked men surrounded his house and wanted to abuse those men. And here's what I think is absolutely tragic. The immoral influence of the day must have worked into Lot's own heart and mind, because we remember what he offered to do there with his two daughters. He offered his daughters to those wicked men. And then, of course, we know that the angels spared the family at that moment. And then they warned Lot to leave the city and he couldn't persuade his family to come with them, with him. Finally, the angels had to literally pull him from the city. And when the fire of God fell, it fell on his married daughters who stayed behind with their husbands. It fell on his sons in law. His wife looked back and turned into a pillar of salt. And then later, his two daughters, no doubt also affected by the immoral climate of the day, without respect for their father, they committed that terrible sin. And then two sons were born who became bitter enemies of Israel. And that little compromise there, it cost Lot, his daughters, his sons in law, his friends in the city, his wife, his own self-respect, the respect of his daughters. He lost his place in society. He probably lost all his physical property. He lost it all. And these things are written for our example, we live in a world of sensuality that's probably on par with Sodom in its day, we're probably as bad then as they were then. And maybe the only reason God hasn't destroyed this world yet is because there are still enough people, righteous people populating this world, carrying out God's righteous purposes. That may be the only reason he hasn't come back yet. And also the fact that he wants the gospel, the kingdom to be proclaimed in every country, in every nation. But the question for us today, and I don't want to spend a lot of time here because I know this is something you've heard me speak a lot about, the compromises that we might make with the world. But I think we continually need to be reminded or we might ask ourselves the question, in what ways might we be pitching our tent towards Sodom? What what what is the direction that we're we're going toward? Those would be good questions for us fathers, especially what inclinations are in our hearts and how far are we looking down the road and what do we want for our families 20 or 30 years down the road or two and three generations down the road? We could have a lot of discussion about this. Some of us had a discussion the other morning that I thought was very profitable. I will say this one thing, and again, this comes across probably a bit negative and is no secret that I am pretty negative on the culture around us in terms of the spirit of the culture. I don't think I'm negative on the people. I love people and we're called to love people with the love of Christ. But the culture has degenerated so far in our day that I would tend to say that any popular new thing that comes along from the culture should probably be scrutinized by the kingdom Christian with a good dose of healthy, godly suspicion. Do we want to be so gullible, so easily swayed, so undiscerning that we swallow up any new idea, any new practice, any new product that is cooked up by this culture and promoted as the latest improvement to our society? Do we want to do that? It seems to me that the kingdom Christian who lives with a very deep awareness that here he has no continuing city and he's seeking the one to come. It's becoming more and more obvious that this world has nothing to offer. It is all artificial and empty. Now, I'm not talking about the physical world is full of beauty. I'm talking about the spirit of the age and the offering that comes out of that through the fallenness in the culture. That world is artificial, empty and plastic. It has nothing for us, for the kingdom. And I think we should be especially careful about the systems and the programs and the philosophies that affect our thinking, because what a man thinks is what he will become. And there's so much that the world is offering on a plate of. Of entertainment, on a plate of various types of media, it's propaganda, it's propaganda from the spirit of the age, which wants to brainwash its citizens with propaganda that's completely alien to the kingdom. And it will want to cause us to pitch our tents towards Sodom. And so I think the answer is to make a choice to pitch our pitch, our tents toward the kingdom and the and the kingdom and the king of kings. I trust we want to do that. Another area of compromise, compromise through ungodly alliances. Now, I want to I want to clarify right at the beginning the difference between alliance and association. Association might involve purposeful friendship, it might involve a certain level of companionship. Jesus had association with sinners for the purpose of drawing them into the kingdom, and so should we. But an alliance would be more a a merging of efforts, a merging of interests, a merging of of ideas and philosophies by persons, families or states or organizations. It's a merging. It goes beyond association and alliances when people's goals, purposes and efforts come together in a common cause. And I say that godliness cannot enter into alliance with ungodliness without compromise happening somewhere. Godliness and ungodliness are not allies in any in any sense of the word. They cannot enter into alliances without compromise happening. And we have the example of good King Jehoshaphat, and I love this man. Let's go back to Second Chronicles. Second Chronicles is a wonderful Old Testament book. It leaves out many of the negative stories that might be in some of the other kings and chronicles. But one of the great kings of Chronicles is Jehoshaphat. And let's read from Second Chronicles chapter 17. Verses one through 13. Second Chronicles 17, one through 13. This is a description of good King Jehoshaphat, the kind of man he was, some of the good things he did. And he's one of my favorite kings. But he made some fatal compromises. Then Jehoshaphat, his son, reigned in his place and strengthened himself against Israel. Look what he did. He placed troops in all the fortified cities of Judah, set garrisons in the land of Judah and in the cities of Ephraim, which Asa, his father, had taken. Now, the Lord was with Jehoshaphat because he walked in the former ways of his father, David. He did not seek the bales, but sought the Lord God of his father and walked in his commandments and did not according to the acts of Israel. Therefore, the Lord established the kingdom in his hand and all Judah gave presence to Jehoshaphat and he had riches and honor in abundance. And I love this. His heart took delight in the ways of the Lord. Moreover, he removed the high places in the wooden images from Israel and from Judah. And I love this even more, almost also in the third year of his reign, he sent his leaders, Ben, Hale, Obadiah, Zechariah, Nathaniel and Micaiah to teach in the cities of Judah. And with them, he sent Levites, Shimei, Nethaniah, Zebediah, Asahiel and these other men, wonderful men, the Levites, and with them, Elishema and Jehoram, the priests. So they taught in Judah and had the book of the law of the Lord with them. And they went throughout all the cities of Judah and taught the people. There's a mobile Bible school that went around Judah, teaching the people, bringing the law of the Lord to them. And the fear of the Lord fell on all the kingdoms of the lands that were around Judah so that they did not make war against Jehoshaphat. And also some of the Philistines brought Jehoshaphat presents and silver as tribute. And the Arabians brought him flocks, 7,700 rams, 7,700 male goats. So Jehoshaphat became increasingly powerful and he built fortresses and storage cities in Judah and so on. The man was amazing. He was a man who feared the Lord, a concern for his people. He brought the Bible back to the common people. And when that happens, when the common people embrace the scriptures once again, what happens is what happened here. The fear, the fear of the Lord fell on all the kingdoms of the land that were even around Judah. And so there was a revival. There was a renaissance that went on, a spiritual renaissance that went on within Judah at that time. And then Chapter 20 is an amazing chapter. It was the time when a great multitude came against Judah and they came to battle against Jehoshaphat in verse one. And the message came and in verse three of Chapter 20, he feared and he set himself to seek the Lord and he proclaimed a fast throughout all of Judah. And then in verse 12, that beautiful conclusion to his prayer, he said, Oh, Lord, our God, will you not judge them? For we have no power against this great multitude that is coming against us, nor do we know what to do. But our eyes are upon you. And about that time, a prophet stood up and began to prophesy. And he said in verse 17, this prophet, you will not need to fight in this battle. Position yourself, stand still and see the salvation of the Lord who is with you. Oh, Judah and Jerusalem, do not fear or be dismayed tomorrow. Go out against them for the Lord is with you. And the next day, then they sent out these singers ahead. They send out this mass choir ahead of the army and the singers began to sing. And the enemy was so confused that they began slaughtering one another. And all that Judah had to do was come after them. And they spent three days gathering up all the loot. And this was this happened in the days of good King Jehoshaphat. It was an amazing thing. Now, but there's something that happened. Let's go to Second Chronicles, chapter 21. Let's see, I'm at the right place. Yes, second Samuel, sorry, Second Chronicles, chapter 21. This is now after Jehoshaphat has passed on and I'll read a little series of verses here. Let's go to Second Chronicles, 21, verse one and then verse four. And Jehoshaphat rested with his fathers and was buried with his fathers in the city of David. Then Jehoram, his son, reigned in his place. Now, down to verse four. Now, when Jehoram was established over the kingdoms, his father, he strengthened himself and killed all his brothers with a sword and also others of the princes of Israel. I go to verse 10 and 11. Thus, Edom has been in revolt against Judah's authority to this day. At that time, Lebanon revolted against his rule because he that is Jehoram, son of Jehoshaphat, had forsaken the Lord God of his fathers. Moreover, he made high places in the mountains of Judah and caused the inhabitants of Jerusalem to commit harlotry and led Judah astray. Now, verse 14. Now, this is in a letter that came from Elijah to Jehoram, and here's the conclusions of Elijah's letter to Jehoram, son of Jehoshaphat. Behold, the Lord will strike your people with a serious affliction, your children, your wives and all your possessions. And it gets a bit graphic. You will become very sick with a disease of your intestines until your intestines come out by reason of the sickness day by day. We'll continue reading. Moreover, the Lord stirred up against Jehoram, the spirit of the Philistines and the Arabians who were near the Ethiopians. And they came up into Judah and invaded it. Now, where is the power of God here? It wasn't present anymore. And they carried away all the possessions that were found in the king's house. Also, his sons and his wives. There was not a son left to him except Jehoaz, the youngest of his sons. And after this, the Lord struck him in his intestines with an incurable disease. Then it happened in the course of time after the end of two years that his intestines came out because of his sickness. So he died in severe pain and his people made no burning for him like the burning for his father's. What a horrible end to the son of good King Jehoshaphat. How could this have happened? Does anybody know how this happened? I'm sure you've read the story. We often we often forget some of these details. But if you go back, let's see if I can find the reference now. Go back to Genesis to second Chronicles 18. We see how it happened. Jehoshaphat in verse one of 18, Jehoshaphat had riches and honor in abundance. And by marriage, he allied himself with Ahab. By marriage, he allied himself with Ahab. What does this mean? Apparently, Jehoshaphat was a man of peace, but he made peace where there should not have been peace. He made peace where there should have been war. And he made an alliance by doing what often happens under monarchies. He had his son marry the daughter of King Ahab. This means that Ahab's daughter moved to Jerusalem, which would have meant that Ahab would be very unlikely to attack Jerusalem and vice versa. Jehoshaphat would have been very unlikely to attack Samaria, Ahab's capital. So it brought peace because there is intertwining of the two families in this alliance. Now, the question is, who was Ahab and who was his daughter? All we have to do is go back to First Kings, Chapter 16. Let's go there. First Kings, Chapter 16. And we see who Ahab was. First Kings 16, 30 to 33. Now, Ahab, the son of Amri, did evil in the sight of the Lord more than all who were before him, and it came to pass as though it had been a trivial thing for him to walk in the sins of Jeroboam, the son of Nebat, that he took as wife Jezebel, the daughter of Ethbaal, king of the Sidonians. And he went and served Baal and worshipped him. Then he set up an altar for Baal in the Temple of Baal, which he had built in Samaria. And Ahab made a wooden image. Ahab did more to provoke the Lord God of Israel to anger than all the kings of Israel who were before him. Now, this was the king of Israel. Jehoshaphat was king in Judah and Jehoshaphat decided that he needed to make peace with this king. And so he married his son off to none other than Jezebel's daughter. Can you imagine that? Who was Jezebel's daughter? Does anybody know that little detail? I mean, I'm sure you could search it out if you had a few minutes here, but it does take some searching. There was another very infamous woman back in that era who ruled Judah for a few years. It was Athaliah. If you put it all together, look at some references there in 2 Chronicles 22. Athaliah is described as the wife of Jehoram, Jehoshaphat's son, and the mother of Azariah. That's right. Jehoshaphat married his son off to Athaliah. It's there. And we know what happened then gets really dramatic. And there's a lot of really graphic history here. But the end of 2 Chronicles is absolutely fascinating. So much drama there. But he married his son to Athaliah. And there was peace in the land. It did work. It worked. This alliance worked for a time. For a time it worked. But what happened then, Jehoram was judged by a prophet. And then Jehoram's son, Azariah, became king. But he was king only a year. And then Jehu came along. He was commissioned by the Lord to deal with this sin in Judah. Jehu came along and slaughtered Azariah, who was Jehoshaphat's grandson. And then Athaliah rose up. She was the mother of Azariah, the widow of Jehoram, Jehoshaphat's son. She rose up and ruled the kingdom for six years. This very ungodly woman, the daughter of Jezebel. Can you imagine the daughter of Jezebel ruling over the people of God for six years? And it was all because of one man's ungodly alliance. But thankfully, we do have that dramatic day after six years of this garbage. Well, I shouldn't say that. Six years of this terrible thing. We have a dramatic scene where Athaliah, the wicked queen, is deposed. And then that one son of Amaziah that had been spared in the temple, the boy King Joash is crowned king. And so there's godliness that came back to the land. But the price of Jehoshaphat's compromise is so great, it caused so much confusion. You had about most of a generation was lost there in Judah. And there is other drama that went on there in Chronicles, Chapter 18. The time when Ahab asked Jehoshaphat to go to war with him and Jehoshaphat's words back to Ahab were, I am as you are. And this is true alliance. I am as you are. My people is your people. We will be with you in the war. And so Ahab and Jehoshaphat went to war together. We know that story, how that Micah or should say Jehoshaphat said, shouldn't we inquire of the Lord first? And so the false prophets came out and they all said, yeah, go to war, you'll win. And then Jehoshaphat said, shouldn't we ask one godly prophet at least? And Micah came out and said something different. Then they put him in prison and then they did go to war. And it did end up that Jehoshaphat almost lost his life because the archers thought he was Ahab because Ahab had disguised himself. And then Jehoshaphat cried out, the Lord delivered him. Then they turned on Ahab and Ahab died in battle there. So it was a lot of confusion, and that's the way these alliances always bring compromise, confusion, ungodliness. Godly alliances made with, I should say, when when godliness tries to ally itself with ungodliness will always lead to compromise. And as in Jehoshaphat's case, many times children are sacrificed in the process. And I believe this is one of the reasons we don't get involved in politics, even in the local level, because the interests and the goals and the efforts of the kingdom of Christ, they simply cannot be merged with the interests and efforts and goals of the kingdoms of this world. Those those two are mutually exclusive. They simply cannot be merged. And here we believe in the true separation of church and state because they are of two different natures. You try to make an alliance between the two. And I would say it almost always leads to compromise. I'm not saying there are never any politicians who do not compromise, but almost inevitably with time there will be compromise. And I say, too, that community work is good so long as the community volunteer work is good so long as our alliances remain with the people of God and with the church. Now, I know that a lot of this message has been sort of negative, but as I said, I intended for it to be a call to vigilance, watchfulness. And I think one of the things that we one of the things I've learned over the years is that some of the things we learn best, we learn from the mistakes and the failures of other people. And so sometimes we have to look at the negative in order to avoid making the same mistakes. And so now the question for us is, how can we as kingdom Christians in this day and age avoid compromise? And that question will have to be answered in another message. And I know we have unresolved questions hanging here. But one thing I would like to say, I do not think that Christ calls us to retreat. We are facing great danger, that is true, and there is danger on every hand and we're faced with pressures to compromise. I do not think this is the time to retreat back behind walls to try to protect ourselves from the danger of compromise, because we know if we go by, if it's true that judgment is in proportion to the offense. Then Jesus would have taught that there was something worse than Sodom. Remember what he taught there in the Gospels? He was looking out over the cities there in his own land, among his own people. And he said to those cities, if the works that have been done in you would have been done in Sodom and Gomorrah, they would have repented a long time ago in sackcloth and ashes. And so what we had there in that day and age is there was some sort of religious blindness that had settled in over a very religious people. And that's a type of the world that can come in and bring compromise. And I don't believe we're there by God's grace. We want to go away from there. But what we don't want is a retreat isolation that will put us in that direction. I believe what God wants from us today, there is a battle to be won. And perhaps the best way to avoid compromise is to take up the sword and enter that battle, the sword of the spirit, which is the word of God. And perhaps more on that later. Let's kneel in prayer. Heavenly Father, we do want your word to warn us. To convict us and to shape our thinking. And we do want to learn from history. And we do acknowledge that we live in a day and age where we are under attack. But we praise you that we have the armor of God on the right hand and on the left hand. And as we take up that armor, we can win and we can avoid compromise. Lord, we need your grace. We need the love of Jesus to fill our hearts and to fill us with passion for the kingdom. Help us not to retreat, but to advance and help our dear people here. I just pray that the love of Christ would be upon all of us and that we would enter the kingdom like little children, realizing our great need. Of a savior, humbling ourselves, entering in through the narrow gate, surrendering ourselves, help us to do that, dear Lord. And help us to forgive one another and to love one another as you have loved us. In Jesus name, I pray. Amen.