Shane Idleman emphasizes the sovereignty of God, explaining that His control over creation brings comfort amidst chaos. He discusses three aspects of God's sovereignty: preservation, concurrence, and government, illustrating how God sustains all things, allows human cooperation, and governs through authorities. Idleman encourages believers to trust in God's plan, even when faced with challenges, and to actively engage in their communities while remaining faithful to God's Word. He highlights the importance of prayer and obedience in navigating life's difficulties, asserting that God is ultimately in control and has a purpose for every situation.

We are talking about the sovereign Lord this morning. Do you know what sovereignty is? Some of you are sovereigns in your home. Some people are sovereigns in the city, in their position of authority. It's a govern, it's a rulership over a certain area. But with God, and what I'm going to do, I'm going to pull out from Wayne Grudem's book. Wayne Grudem wrote a book on systematic theology. And I was going to bring it and show you this morning, but it was too heavy. To carry around. And here's what he defines sovereignty as. I'm going to pull a few points from his work. God's exercise of power over all of His creation. That pretty much sums it up, doesn't it? Because, I mean, there's terms, they're like two paragraphs long on what God's sovereignty is. But what it is, is God's ability to exercise His power over all His creation. And in that there's a lot of comfort, because you realize that it's not the government, or different nations, or the neighbor up the street that you have to worry about, or even the crime, right? We worry about that a lot, and that's why a lot of people move, is crime and different things. But when you understand that God is sovereign, it really begins to put your mind at ease, because He's the one ultimately in control. And there's only three areas I'm going to talk about this morning. It's in the area of sovereignty. If you look at systematic theology, they'll take sovereignty, and they'll have three points underneath it. One of those is, the first point is preservation. The next point is going to be concurrence, and the third point is government. Don't worry, I'm going somewhere with this. It matters to your life. It's not just application, I mean, it's not just theory, it is actually very good application. So here's preservation. Kind of you can get from the word that God preserves things. God keeps all created things existing and maintaining the properties in which He created them. Hebrews 1.3 tells us that Christ is upholding the universe by the power of His Word. Here's something interesting. Wayne Grubin said that this just really struck me all week. If Christ were to cease His continuing activity of sustaining all things in the universe, then everything except the triune God would cease to exist, or would instantly cease to exist. If Christ stopped upholding everything, if He just stopped that, everything would no longer be upheld. And there's other verses that in Christ He's holding up the universe. The particles, the atoms, the protons, everything is held up by Him. It's an interesting truth that is just mind-boggling if we think about it. Our dependence on God is affirmed every time we pray, God give us our daily... Jesus taught us to pray, God give us our daily bread. And here's where some confusion comes in. That prayer has to be backed by a little bit of effort. Right? Have you ever just been on the couch praying? Unless you're George Mueller and a dairy truck breaks down in front of your house and feeds the orphans in the orphanage. Most of us have to work a little bit, and he did work. He worked in prayer and different things, but you're not going to be praying often and there's a bag of groceries on your front porch. God does that sometimes. He'll answer prayer that way, but more often than not we work, which I'm going to get to the next point with concurrence, we work with God's sovereignty. So God give us our daily bread means that we get up and we do something about it. And I like that old saying that I pray as if it's all up to God, which it is, but I work as if it's all up to me because God blesses diligence. God blesses hard work. God blesses labor. God looks upon those who are diligent and hardworking. He favors that person because the opposite of that is lazy and slothful. Those aren't encouraging words in the Bible. And we all have the tendency to go in that direction, don't we? Our flesh by nature is not hardworking. It's like to sleep all day if it could. It'd be NASCAR, popcorn, cookies, ice cream, pizza delivery, and then reruns of your favorite television shows or whatever on the Hallmark Channel if we could, right? Be honest. If the flesh got its way today, we would not be here, most of us, pajamas all day, drinking and eating our favorite things, and we would not be very productive. So even though we pray, God, give us our daily bread because we know He brings the rain. He sustains. He does everything. It's in His sovereignty. We also cooperate with His sovereignty. Now, He may relent. This is interesting. What's hard about this type of topic, of theology, is really this could go for about a month on God's sovereignty. I could do four weeks, six weeks, and there's so many different areas, but I just try to pull out the main things. And even in God's sovereignty, He will relent. The Bible uses the word repent, but I don't really like that as much, depending on the translation, because we think that God is repenting from sin. He's not. He's repenting, meaning He's changing His mind or He'll change something. That's why I do believe that prayer is powerful because in Hezekiah's case, one king, God said, hey, listen, you're gonna die in a certain amount of time, and he pleaded with God, and he pleaded with God, and the prophet went to him and said, God has heard your prayers. He's relented. He's changed His mind, and you will, I believe it was 15 extra years that he got on his life. And I think of 2 Chronicles 7, 14 often. If my people who are called by my name will humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, I will forgive their sins, and I will begin to rebuild and cleanse their land. I will change my course based on your response. So God says, here's what's going to happen. This is the interesting about judgment, whether you believe in judgment upon a nation, judgment upon a group of people, judgment on a person, that God will pronounce something saying, this is going to happen. But if you change certain conditions that are allowing this, God can relent and change His course, change His mind in that area and allow your prayers to be heard. Now, of course, we don't know how that works, and that's why it gets confusing, right? Because we want to know what, when, why, where, when, and how, and I want to know today. But within God's sovereignty is His perfect will. And on that, it doesn't matter how hard you pray, you can fast, you can pray, you can plead the blood, and it won't matter if it's His perfect will, in my opinion. When something is, and when He says, this is what's going to happen. Now, inside of perfect will, you have permissive will. Keep rabbit trails, keep growing here, right? There's one rabbit hole, there's another rabbit hole, there's another rabbit hole. But inside of perfect will, there's permissive will and what He allows us to change course on or what He allows us to redirect. So we just live according to God's word and we trust in Him. We know He knows what's best. We pray for His permissive will. God, are you going to allow this to happen? But we don't know what your perfect will is. So it's good just to stay flexible and humble in this area. Because if we try to overthink things, we can get in trouble. Because there's people who think, well, it's God's will. God's will, I fell into sin. God's will, I left my spouse. God's will, that I just, well, and we can have this view of everything as God's will. It's almost like a puppeteer. You know how He's got the strings and you're going to do whatever He wants you to do. But we don't see that in Scripture. We see a cooperation. Because man is ultimately held responsible for his actions. That's why a lot of people in evangelical Christianity, there are two different views on this, on salvation. You know that God elects certain people and the rest He doesn't elect. Or the belief that God, that man has the ability to accept or reject God's gracious gift of salvation. And if they reject it, then they are then judged based on their actions. They're accounted for on their actions. You can't have both of those be true. So that's part of God's sovereignty. Now, again, people become frustrated because we don't know how it works, exactly why it works. I have a lot of questions just like you do. Right, for example, how can God be completely sovereign? But how can man have a responsibility to do certain things? Because you would think as man is making changes, or man is making choices, that God would be caught off guard. But we know God's not caught off guard. He knows what's happening. So are the choices predetermined, pre-ordained, all these things? All we know is what the Bible teaches is that man is held responsible for his actions. So on this first point of preservation, that God keeps all created things preserved, basically, here's the application. I want the Scripture on the screen, probably throughout the sermon if possible, because this is going to be a good reminder for all of us. Here's the application. Whenever I am afraid, I will trust in You. In God, I will praise His Word. That basically means in respect of You, God, I will look to Your Word. I will look to the promises You have made. In God, I have put my trust. I will not fear. What can flesh do to me? And you have to be reminded that often, don't we? Because He says here, whenever I am afraid, that means we get afraid in our broken humanity, but when that happens, I will trust in You and I will put my mind back on You. Because where the mind goes, the body follows, right? Where the mind goes, the body follows. So I will put my trust in You. I will put my hope in You. I will praise Your Holy Name. What can flesh do to me? What can man do to you? Let me ask that question. Is there anything man can do to you where you're worried about man and not God? There's nothing we can do. So that's the application. So how would that fit into our own lives? Well, here's how. What about anyone going through court battles, legality issues, tough decisions? Come on, lots of yeses, right? The rebellious child, the broken marriage, failing health. That's why the title is God's Got This. Regardless of what it is, God has got this. He's got this. I was reminded of the old hymn in the 1800s. Many of you will know the name once I say a few of these stanzas. When we walk with the Lord in the light of His Word, what a glory He sheds on our way. While we do His good will, He abides with us still and with all who trust and obey. Trust and obey. There's no other way to be happy in Jesus but to trust and obey. So God's got this, but often we need to realign ourselves with trusting and obeying. Because when we get outside of that, and I'm not trusting, I'm fearful now. Usually when I'm fearful, I'm not obeying. Right? Because I'm going to do things my way. I'm scared, so I'm going to react instead of respond. So we have to realign ourselves again with trust and obey. For example, the court battle. You have to be humble and gracious. You have to reflect the nature of Christ. Tough decisions. We have to submit and wait versus yelling and cursing. The rebellious child, you have to be loving and gentle, not sarcastic and throwing a Bible at them. Right? Reposition. Reposition ourselves. The broken marriage, all of the above. Humble, gracious, submit, wait on God, loving and gentle. Not yelling, sarcastic, throwing the Bible, throwing things. It's all about repositioning. And that leads me to the next point. Concurrence. Here's this part of God's sovereignty. Concurrence. God cooperates with created things in every action, directing their distinct properties to cause them to act as they do. You might go, what? What exactly is he talking about? Well, the Idelman version is this. God cooperates with created things and within that, He allows them certain freedoms, even though He is still sovereign. Now, we know that it's hard to give examples of God and the Trinity or different things, but for example, those who are sovereign in your home, you are the sovereign, right? You had guidelines. You were leading. You were in leadership. But within that home, you didn't control every action of the children or the people. Right? So within your sovereignty, they had choices. They had freedom. They had actions and they were going to be held responsible for those actions. Now, the one bad thing about that analogy is God's not us and we're not God. So He can go outside of that and do things that we couldn't do. But my point was to try to give you this impression of God where He allows us to make choices within His sovereignty. And that's what gets confusing. Well, God, if you're such a good God, how did you allow this to happen? And see, that's where it's hard too because we know, let's take for disease, for example. We know that disease is the result of the fallen nature. Right? Something happens in our DNA, the DNA sequencing, the cells not being able to replicate, the body not being able to heal itself. Something happens in our DNA. But we want God to fix everything. But in His sovereignty, He allowed man the choice. Man sinned, sin entered in. So now it's almost, and that's one of the big arguments for when people ask, well, what is, especially in Christianity, why would a good God allow evil? Why would He? The choice is either He stops all evil and we become utopia now, or He allows the choices of others to run themselves out. But within those choices, He can stop and say cancer healed. Diabetes healed. Multiple sclerosis healed. I mean, that's why on this topic, on one hand it's exciting for me, but on the other hand it's frustrating. Because I read, I read a lot of books on revival and different things that are happening in different countries, third world countries, and either all these people are lying, or you will see God healing in powerful ways. People being set free. Of disease they've been struggling with. All kinds of things. That Jesus is going to set you free this morning. And during worship a person is just, no more cancer, no more multiple sclerosis, no more Parkinson's, it's just, they've been healed, they've been set free. But why not everybody? Why some? And see, that's where you get the headache. And you go, God, why, why? Because I truly believe when people come in, in wheelchairs, if God prompts me, and there's a strong, strong faith rising up, and God, you know, He's doing, I have no problem praying for those people. And watching God do that. But I'm also cautious enough to know that if God's not in it, nothing's going to happen. So being sensitive to the move of the Holy Spirit. Do we get into a point where we're not that desperate for God? And if we're not that desperate, we probably won't be seeking Him to the degree many people, because when you go to, when I read these stories in other places, all they have is God. Or nothing. Not Blue Cross, not Blue Shield, not I'll put it on Visa, not UCLA and Northridge down the street. God. That's it. And see, I often wonder how much of that comes into play, because without faith, it's impossible to please God. And God often said, because of your faith, because of your belief. But we also don't, and I don't believe in the name it and claim it type faith movement. You just have to have enough faith. Nobody should be sick. Everybody should be healed. Come on. It's all contingent upon your faith. But then that kind of puts faith above sovereignty, doesn't it? Because then God becomes under my control versus the other way around. So this is a, it's a frustrating topic. It's an exciting topic. But on one hand, I do see, I mean, if everybody's prayed for, right? Then Shane's elevated to Jesus Christ. If everybody I pray for is healed, or any teacher, any preacher, anybody, if they're perfect, if they're the Midas touch, what do they call that? Jesus could heal everybody perfectly because he knew the will of the Father. But we don't know the will of the Father many times. So it's an interesting topic because people can get frustrated. But the psalmist declares that whatever the Lord pleases, he does in heaven and on earth. Even according to Proverbs 16, even the lot is cast into the lap, but the decision is wholly from the Lord. Now, we don't do that today. I wouldn't advise it, but in the Old Testament, even a little bit in the New, in the book of Acts, they would cast lots. And they would say, okay, Lord, what's your decision? They cast a lot. And even that decision was from the Lord. I believe that's how they picked a disciple. Matthias, Matthias, however you pronounce it. And God's not going, why did the lot fall on that? I didn't want Matthias. Man, that's going to ruin my whole plan here. Now I'm going to have to have Paul meet me on the road to Damascus. Now I'm going to have to have him write a book of the Bible. So God's not confused. So even that decision was of the Lord. It's just amazing to sit. This week I was just in awe with a bit of hay and a headache. I was in awe, like this is incredible, but my brain does not understand how this can all work together. And that's the beauty of it. And people think they want to know everything God does. That would be impossible. You'd just explode. You would cease to exist. The atoms, the protons, and all this, to try to understand who God is. So here's the thing. God's sovereignty is the primary cause. Our involvement is the secondary cause. And we talked about His perfect will, His permissive will. And what I do is I trust in His perfect will, but I pray for the permissive will. So if something comes up in my family or in the church, Lord, I'm praying, I'm praying that You would change this course based on what I know. But see, that's another twist in this. We pray based on what we can see. God makes decisions based on the future and His sovereignty. Country music fans, you remember that old song? Garth Brooks. Thank God for unanswered prayers. If it was him. I don't know who started that thing. But isn't that true? Thank God for unanswered prayers. Come on, let's be real this morning. You run into somebody you haven't seen 10 years. Thank God I wasn't going to marry them. Right? We dated. We dated. God, You rescued me. Oh, thank God for unanswered prayers. I was on my face praying and praying and praying. And God said, nope. And we look back and we go, thank God for unanswered prayers. Because that would have destroyed me. Or in other areas, that we look back and we say, God, You know it's a perfect father. So that's why trust and obey comes in because we can get mad. Why did You take my family member? Why did this person pass away? God, I'm so mad right now. Why is my child sick? I mean, it's very hard to rejoice in the storm when your child is suffering. And others surround you. So it's a hard thing for a believer. But again, what is the application for this point as well? God's got this. Right? If you can memorize that, that would be very beneficial. Whenever I am afraid, I will trust in You. And God, I will praise His Word. And God, I have put my trust. I will not fear. I'm sorry. I put my trust. I will not fear. What can flesh do to me? And this is why Romans 8.28 is so important. And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are called according to His purpose. So here's the big question. Do you love Him? Are you in His will? Those are the things we need to worry about. All things work together if we love Him and we're living according to His will. Now I know many of you are thinking, oh, I messed up here and there. Welcome to the club. I don't think it's said those who love God to those who are called according to His purpose, who live perfect lives without any sin, they never do anything wrong, then He will work it out for your good. See, here's the thing, and I want to be cautious here, obviously, because you don't give people permission to sin, ever. But you do encourage them in the sin. You say that God's got this. If you get your heart right, it doesn't matter what your past was. Do you realize that? The devil used accusation after accusation about your past. Oh, you remember, hot shot. Don't you remember what you used to do? But God doesn't do that. Every time the devil does that, you just remind him of his future. That's all you have to do. So once the heart gets right and we reposition ourselves in the center of God's will, He can do amazing things. Yes, there are consequences. I say that often. There's consequences, but do you live in God's arms, redeemed and forgiven, or do you continue to live outside of His will? And people come to church discouraged and they go home discouraged because they're always allowing their past to shape their future. So in God's sovereignty, He says, if you come back to me. And it's interesting. Many scriptures throughout the Old Testament primarily aren't always written from a perspective that people are living perfect lives. If you turn back to me. Remember, if my people humble themselves and pray, it tells me they haven't humbled themselves. They've been bad boys and girls. Right? They haven't humbled themselves. So God says, if you turn back to me, if you seek me, if you renew your commitment, if you get back on track. Through concurrence, this aspect of theology we've been talking about, the enemy tries to derail God's train. Concurrence means we work in cooperation with God. But the enemy will try to derail that train, won't he? That's what I believe one of his primary purposes is or what his goal is. If a believer's a believer until the day they die, then he's going to try to stop your productivity. He's going to try to silence your voice. Detours to your destiny, basically. So here's how it works. Running alongside the sovereignty of God is the devil trying to trip the runner. Sitting next to the architect is the devil with an eraser. In case you don't quite get it yet, this last one should help even more. Standing next to the master builder is the devil with his hand on the wrecking ball. That's how we live. God's sovereignty, I'm working with God in his sovereignty, and you've got a menace that's trying to sidetrack you every chance he gets with throwing rocks, putting things in your way. That's how he works. And think of this for a minute. Moses, right? God's plan, Moses, to deliver the people of Israel. What happened to try to stop that plan? What did Pharaoh try to do? The Hebrews are getting way too strong. Let's kill all the male children. Now, I don't know about you, but that would be a pretty horrific scene. Watching children being killed when they're born. And Moses was, see, the enemy comes in, tries to stop the plan of God. Moses continues, he's put in Pharaoh's house, and we know what happened there. What about Esther? Wicked Haman tried to wipe out all of the Jews. God had a plan for this people to bring the Messiah. So here comes Haman, and through the works of the enemy, to try to sidetrack that destiny. Anybody remember when Jesus was born? They even quoted the prophet that was writing Rachel as crying for her children. The king slaughtered all children, all males 2 and under, to try to stop that messianic reign, to try to stop Jesus. So what God's trying to do, the enemy comes in and tries to stop that plan. Everyone, I'm assuming all of you have heard of Adolf Hitler trying to eradicate Jews? Do you know what's happening a lot in, maybe you don't follow a lot of this, but in Syria or the Middle East, there are towns or areas where they've wiped out, they've killed all the Christians. Do you understand that? As we're sitting in pews, with heating and air conditioning at right temperatures, there are villages, there are entire groups of people being slaughtered for their faith. Now here's the interesting thing, I had a lot more examples, I'm sure you can think of examples. Even the cross, the cross of Christ, the enemy thought was going to finally get rid of Jesus, but in God's sovereignty, that's why Paul said if the enemies of darkness knew what they were doing, they would have never crucified the Lord of Glory. They would have never done that. Had they known, see they tried to stop God's sovereignty. Now here's where it gets interesting. Hmm. I had to just pray for peace all week on this point. And there's more examples I could have given from nations, from the Hittites and the Amorites and the Babylonians and the Assyrians, and you see the devil coming alongside. Here's the third aspect of sovereignty. God's governmental authority. God's sovereignty over government. See all of these things I just mentioned were because of the governing authorities. God often works through and evil often works through governing authorities. That's why this area is so important. On this issue of government it says this, God has a purpose in all that He does in the world and He providentially governs or directs all things in order that they accomplish His purposes. We read in Psalm 103.19 His kingdom rules over all. So it's not who's more powerful. Russia's coming here, China, America. It's He rules over all. Now there is a concept here that government is bad. You're going to hear it more lately as these kids that get a microphone think they know everything about the world at 18 years old. That government's bad, America's bad, and all these things. I don't know what's going to happen, but we have to remember something. That God often governs through government. God institutes three institutions. The family, the church, and the government. And whether we like it or not, God directs, God restrains evil, God does certain things through government. Now, of course, it all comes to our mind, well what about this government? What about Russia? Or China? Or China? Have you read North Korea? And what about America? Look at how far we've drifted in different things. But in all of those governments, Putin, for example, is still restraining evil in the sense of the drug trafficking. China, for example. The Middle East, if you get caught trafficking drugs, you will be killed. China, they have rules against certain types of evil. The problem is, they're also against God and their definition of evil. But let me read a scripture to you. I've quoted some from time to time. I don't know if I put it up on the screen in quite a while. Romans 13. Romans 13. Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities. It's telling Christians, we are to be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God. And the authorities that exist are appointed by God. Now what happens to, let's say in the case of North Korea or China, is you will have atheistic regimes hundreds and hundreds if not thousands of years ago that are still in power. That's the difference. You have maybe when Europe was formed or when America was formed, you see a different type of spiritual climate. New Zealand, Australia, the Middle East has been primarily Muslim, which they draw from Abraham. Ishmael, a different child of Abraham than the Jews would. Isaac. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They would look at Abraham's lineage differently. So you have this type of Islam grow up in the Middle East. So it's usually those governing authorities have been there a while. That's what's interesting. So God puts the governing authorities in positions of leadership for this purpose. Therefore, whoever resists authority resists the ordinance of God. And those who resist will bring judgment on themselves. For rulers are not a tear to good works but to evil. Here we go. He's saying here, whoever resists authority resists the ordinance of God. And those who resist will bring judgment on themselves. Obviously, he's not talking about when a government makes a law, for example, someday, legally, I have to marry gay couples then I would have to break that law. I can't go. It goes against God's word. If they say, listen, you can no longer preach from Romans. You can't do this type of church. You can't preach. You can't witness to people. Then I would have to break that law because God's law supersedes man's law. So what he's talking about here, though, is not that. He's talking about evil actions. Evil actions. And I'm in agreement with John Piper in his commentary on this. He knows that Paul is writing Romans to the church in Rome. He knows, obviously, Caesar is going to read his writings because they don't get out from Paul and out to the other churches without the governing authorities looking at those. So he's probably reminding Caesar, listen, you're to be a tear to those who do evil. And that's why God orchestrates government, especially in our nation, many years ago, that the government is supposed to restrain evil and deter wrongdoing. And the church is supposed to be the conscience of the nation. So technically, you could have them running together in the sense of the government does this, the church does this. But what happens now with our government is they take on a lot of the church's responsibility and things get very convoluted. So rulers, the goal is God's design is there to be a tear to good works. They are not to be a tear to good works, but to evil. So that's why, for example, how can a Christian, they say this, how can a Christian be for war? Well, number one, I'm not for war. I'm against war. But God puts into position governing authorities that supersede my authority that they are to avenge those who do evil. And Augustine wrote about, if you're interested, it's called the just war theory. When a nation goes to war, there has to be three conditions meant biblically for them to do that. But it's not me being excited about, it's not me killing people, it's not me, it's God putting people in positions of authority to do his justice. For example, how would you bring tyrannical forms of government to justice? How would you go against wicked regimes? Now, of course, all of us are thinking, well, what about this? What about that one? What about this? Yeah, with sinful man, you'll get sinful actions. But you don't throw out the baby with the bathwater. So that's the things with Christians, being a pacifist. People say, an individual's a pacifist. That's wonderful. Personally, as an individual, I have to err on the side of passivity. Right? I'm not going to grab a gun, I'm not going to go to war. But if I'm working, then become under that government authority, a sheriff, right? An army, navy, air force, marine, SEAL Team 6. If you're under that government authority, then you actually have an obligation by God to be avengers of justice, to do his will in this area. Because if you've got a thousand terrorists who want to rape, pillage, and kill, then I have a responsibility if I'm in the military to defend that nation that they are coming against. Just war theory means that there's an equal, or there's actually a legitimate concern. You don't just go in and take territory or different things. And America has done that before. There's not, it's not, here's the thing with America. The foundation, the foundation was good and godly, but corrupt men came in and brought in things like slavery, or how they handled the Native American Indians, or how they took this war was not good, or that wasn't good. But at the core, at the core was men and women fleeing persecution from England to Holland, then to the United States, the pilgrims, the Puritans. You look at their writings. If anybody wants to really know what people believed, what you have to do is you have to read the original intent of the founders, not secular revisionists of what they thought and what they said. You have to go to their own writings. You have to look at what they believed. What did they say? Because the media, the college educational systems, everything is going to twist, the twist, the founding. They're going to twist things and they're going to make, well here's how bad they were. Look at what they did. So I just go to the original writings. Let me read what the founders of the nation said. Let me read, I've got a book out there, One Nation Above God, or I'll have to bring more copies, where I've got three pages at the end of all the founding fathers who were against slavery. Quote after quote after quote. Why don't you ever hear about them? Why? Because there's an agenda. Civil unrest. Let's get the African Americans and whites and Latinos, let's get everybody fighting again. There's an agenda there. Civil unrest. But we're to bring civil rest as believers. That's why there's no color of skin. There's nothing. We love all believers. I love any type of believer to come to church. That's the heart of Christ. But the media and different groups will begin to shake and stir that to cause dissension. So all you have to do is look at their original writings. Look at what they did, what they believed. Do you want to be unafraid of authority? Do what is good and you'll have praise from the same. For He is God's minister to you for good. Talking about the government officials, Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines. But if you do evil, be afraid. For He does not bear the sword in vain. For He is God's minister and avenger to execute wrath on him who practices evil. See, back in the old days, in the Old Testament, it was vigilantialism, if that's a word. Do you know what that is? Do you know what a vigilante is? You kill my brother? Guess what? I'm coming after you. And that was legit. They actually had safe haven cities where people could flee to. Sanctuary cities, right? The right kind. I'm not going there. You guys... Now, I told you this isn't... Because government affects more than you think. Government affects more than you think. God will often work through Romans 13, but the enemy will pervert Romans 13 against believers, against those truly following Christ. The enemy wants to silence the voice of truth in the area of government. That's what he... Can you... Sometimes I want to just go drive and drive and drive and drive and get my... Because people think like government's bad, the church is great, let's just do our little kumbaya and pray the gospel, but don't get involved in this area of life. Well, this area affects everything else. This area affects everything, the future, the generation, where your kids are growing up. I'm not getting political, I'm getting biblical. God has something to say about every facets of life. There was a 19th century historian, Benson Lossing, I think his name was, in the 1800s. He says, In those days, politics were preached in the pulpits and men were led to action on the side of freedom by faithful pastors. And that's my thought. What if getting political is getting biblical? Now, hear me. Understand my heart. I'm not saying let's get carried away. But you see all these huge issues now, right? Huge issues that we don't want to talk about because that's bad. I mean, Christians can work at Lockheed, Northrop, Hollywood, waste management, everything you can name, but don't go make a difference over here. Well, this affects everything. Think about this. Let me get this straight. Let me get this straight. Let me see if you're following me here. You can have your gun protest, you can Twitter your favorite candidate, you can lie in the media, you can teach evolution to our kids, you can flaunt sexual sin and gay marriage, you can teach preschool kids about transgenderism, you can support murdering a child in the womb, but I need to keep my mouth shut? Oh, no, I don't think so. I'll give you. Now, listen. I'll give you this when you pry it out of my cold, dead hands. That's what it should say. You know the old saying, you can have my gun when you pry it out of my cold, dead hands. You can have the Bible. Why can everybody voice everything else, but the pulpit needs to be silent? It makes no sense. Let me tell you why, because they want to silence the voice of truth. God's Word has something to say about murdering children. God's Word has something to say about the sanctity of life. God's Word has to say something about He created them male and female that they be joined together. It has something to say about putting on men's clothing if you're a woman. It has something to say. So why silence the voice of truth? Why? That's my question. I don't understand. I understand, don't get political. It's about the Gospel. But when the Gospel changed my heart, I got concerned for these issues. I mean, those people on TV, they'd say, man, separate your faith. Separate your faith from your life. How? That's not even biblical. That's not even biblical. See, we're not talking about paving the roads. I could care less. We're not talking about building a bridge somewhere. We are talking about important moral issues that will have huge ramifications. When a nation departs from God, be careful. Be careful. Judgment always follows in these cases. What are you leaving for your grandchildren, your children? But Christians want to silence their mouth. They want to be quiet. They just want to say, Kumbaya, feed the homeless and be quiet. Don't get involved in these things. Well, look at how much it's cost us in 50 years. Did you know they used to pray in the school? Do you understand that? They used to pray in the school. Read Bibles. They might even say the pledge. And I'm so sick of this politically correct culture that can't offend anyone except believers. Change it to he and she and it and this. Don't offend anything. Well, have you ever stopped to consider that you might have offended me? Have you offended God? See, here's the thing. You can't be bold and truthful and soft and quiet. I've tried. It doesn't work. Right? You can't be bold and truthful and soft and quiet. Sometimes you've got to stir the hornet's nest. The pulpit sets the tone for the nation, not Fox News and CNN. This should tell us what to say. What do we do with our borders? What does this say? What does this say? What do we do with guns and self-defense? What does this say? What do we do with gay marriage? These are huge issues. See, they want to silence the pulpit. You just do your little church stuff. Let us control the world. Let us control the United States. But let me say this. I love all of those who struggle with sin because I struggle. But we must stop mocking God and flaunting our sin. If you truly want freedom, you must repent. That's how people truly get freedom. Let me just throw in a few quotes here. I do not believe that the Constitution was the offspring of inspiration. But I am as perfectly satisfied that the union of the states in its forms and adoption is as much the work of divine providence, our topic, as any of the miracles recorded in the Old and New Testament. Any idea who said that? Signer of the Declaration of Independence. Benjamin Rush. If you want to run for office in our nation, you had to profess of faith in Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit to even run for office. The Mayflower Compact, coming over on the Mayflower to the glory of God and to the advancement of the Christian faith. Do we do everything right? Of course not, because the enemy comes in and brings the wrecking ball. Stop glorifying the wrecking ball and thinking the foundation is wrong. I can take you to Harvard and Princeton and Yale, all founded by Christians. All scholars shall be religious, godly, and blameless. According to the rules of God's Word, they should diligently read the Holy Scriptures. Requirements of Yale College in 1701. Anybody get this? They mock this now. They're doing whatever they can to get God out of the courthouse, remove the Ten Commandments, get rid of His Word. Our laws and our institutions must be based upon the embodiment of the teachings of the Redeemer of mankind. It is impossible that it should be otherwise. In this sense, and to this extent, our civilizations and our institutions are empathetically Christian. Richmond v. Moore, the Illinois Supreme Court, 1883. See, I just read, I've got actually a book, it's called Original Intent. Of all the founders' words, do you know something wasn't even, they would reference the Bible four times more than any other source when putting together the documents for the founding of the nation? Well, this person, this. Yeah, exactly. The devil comes in with a wrecking ball. According to God's sovereignty. See, we can openly acknowledge God in all areas of government because our government was built on His Word, His precepts, and His principles. We must acknowledge Him as the source of our nation's strength. Do you realize that? We can acknowledge, probably it's not gonna happen, right? I'm not naive. I don't live on a cloud. Up in the sky. Oh, wouldn't that be nice? Utopia. No, we're going to hell in a handbasket. But I'm praying for revival. Without God, I should say. Without revival. You look at how far we've drifted. And we can openly and acknowledge the sovereign hand of God. The school district, the courts, the Supreme Court. See, we've catered to political correctness. If it's His standard, His rules, His governance, we can openly acknowledge that. Because Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion. We're not establishing a religion. We're acknowledging God's sovereign hand. On what He has done. And then all these groups like to use separation of church and state. You know, it's nowhere in the Constitution. Nowhere. Thomas Jefferson wrote a letter to the Baptists. And he said, don't worry, it's not going to become a national denomination. There will be a wall of separation between the church and state so they can work and function separately. But then the court takes that phrase and now says, oh, now that means church, you can't be involved in anything. Get the church out of everything. Separation of church and state. That's not what it meant. The people who started the nation would roll over in their grace. Because the whole reason for coming and founding it was to elevate God's word. Was to build a city upon a hill. I mean, think of Benjamin Franklin, wasn't even a believer. Said, gentlemen, gentlemen. They were having a hard time with the Constitution. He said, gentlemen, if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without His notice, is it possible that an empire can rise without His aid? Proclaiming days of prayer and fasting? Clinton, Obama, Trump, Bush, where are you? Where's these, let's get down and call these days of fasting and prayer. Where is that? See, that's the heart. And that's why my concern is the devil works primarily like God does through governing authorities. So to say Christians don't need to be involved makes no sense. Because it's God's concept. It's His institution. It's God's institution. So run for office, vote, make a difference for the glory of God, my goodness. Stop putting the handcuffs on. Now again, there are different callings. Obviously, that's not my primary calling. My primary calling is preaching. But thank God for those whose primary calling is to make a difference. Can you imagine if all those people making a difference stopped to cease to exist? You'd think North Korea is bad. That we would resemble that. That's a country without the breath of God in it. So I'll close with this. It's a poem I have. I'm just going to do the abridged version. And it does fit because we're talking about sovereignty. God's providential sovereignty and His role in government. One nation under God was their cry and declaration. Upon the law of nature's God they built a mighty nation. For unlike mankind before them who had walked this earth and sowed, these men would never have questioned the sovereignty of God. So with a firm reliance on divine providence for protection, they pledged their sacred honor and sought His wise direction. They lifted up and appealed to God for all the world to see and vowed their independence forever to be free. I'm glad they're not here with us to see the mess we're in, how we've given up our righteousness for a life of indulgent sin. For when abortion isn't murder and sodomy is deemed a right, then evil now is called good and darkness is now called light. While truth and law were founded on the God of all creation, man, now through law, denies that truth and calls it separation. No longer does man see a need for God when he's in full control, for the only truth self-evident is in the latest pull. But with man as his own master we fail to count the cost, our precious freedoms vanish, and our liberty is lost. Children are told they can't pray in school and they teach them evolution. When will they see that the fear of God is the only true solution? And I'm well aware that the majority of the people who need to hear this aren't going to hear this. I'm preaching to the cheerleaders. But sometimes the cheerleaders need a little encouragement, don't they? And back to the verse I began with in Psalm. Whenever I'm afraid, I will trust in you. Whenever I'm afraid, I will trust in you. And God, I will praise his word. And God, I put my trust. I will not fear what can flesh do to me. So even though we get worked up and we get passionate, without that you wouldn't make a difference. So in God's sovereignty he uses our discontent, the decline we see, to motivate us to action. So don't get beat up. Get into prayer and fasting mode. Or discouraged, I should say. Get into prayer and fasting mode. Pray, Lord, how can I make a difference? See, we need to motivate the church again in this area. And again, I don't get political. I don't mention candidates. I don't sign every petition. But if you just Google things they're trying to pass in Sacramento. If it goes through, I cannot tell somebody that there's hope for them in their gay lifestyle. I have to affirm it. Did you catch that? Anybody been reading the first or second amendment lately? I mean, freedom of speech. But here's why all this is happening. Nobody cares. It doesn't matter. It doesn't affect me. Not yet. How many of you are silent now in your workplace? You could talk about God all the time. I'm in Northrop, Lockheed Rock, all the time 30 years ago. Law enforcement, sheriff's department. I just took a tour of the big courthouse Saturday. And all the things, the changes they have to make to be politically correct. You murder someone, we'll make sure they have their three square meals, that their chair's soft, that they have this shower time, they have all this political. Don't call them that. Don't say anything bad. Don't call them this name. This is, it's unbelievable. We have a heart of love, but we also have a heart of love for God's word. And when it's being trampled on, when it's being ridiculed, when it's being mocked, there should be a holy, a righteous indignation that rises up in you. Not to do evil. Not to do evil. We don't return evil with evil. We get on our faces and we pray. And we fast and we seek God. Lord, how do you want me to make a difference? Listen, I prayed that 18, 19 years ago. And God gave me a huge passion for this area. A lot of research in American history. A lot of research in this area for a purpose. 19 years ago, nobody would hear this. Now this will probably go to 20, 30, 40, 50,000 people on the radio in different places. But Lord, I can't do anything. I'm a country boy, no education. What do you want me to do? But I had a passion. See, he gave me the desire to speak this truth. And hopefully I'll be going to Washington, D.C. at some point. We've got, there's people I know that are close to advisory committees for the president wanting to get younger pastors. Not political, biblical. Because if you're upset at this, I dare you, I challenge you to find me one scripture that says I need to shut my mouth on abortion and gay marriage. And not talk about any of these things. Just one scripture. That's all, one scripture. And I'll show you a plethora of scriptures that say we need to stand up for the word of God. Not arrogantly. And not with, because half the time I'm holding back tears. So it's not arrogance. It's brokenness. Like Nehemiah, why should I not be sad? The king said, this is nothing but sadness of heart. Nehemiah said, why should I not be sad when the place of my father's tombs lies in waste? Why shouldn't I be sad? See, it's actually, I should ask you the question, why aren't you? It's okay for a kindergartner to be taught transgenderism and to encourage that in them? My goodness, somebody should go fire that teacher. I need to stop. I just need to stop. Nope, nope, nope. I'm stopping because I'm going to get in trouble. Jesus had enough at one point. He started making a whip. You know, if I've had enough of this, I'm driving out these money changers. We need righteous indignation again that gets us to our face before God.