Our scripture reading this morning is a little longer than usual, but it seemed, at this time in the life of our nation and in our lives, it seemed to be important, so we're gonna read on Malachi, that's the very last book of the Old Testament, beginning in chapter three, verses seven through 18, and then continuing on chapter four one two six and elder brian will do that for us this is the word of the only true and living god i'm reading from the book of malachi chapter three verse verse seven through chapter four verse six and i'm reading from the nasb 1995 from the days of your fathers you have turned turned aside for my statutes and have not kept them. Return to me, and I will return to you, says the Lord of hosts. But you say, how shall we return? Headed you have robbed God. Will a man rob God? Yet you are robbing me. But you say, how have we robbed you? In tithes and offerings, you are cursed with a curse, for you are robbing me. the whole nation of you. Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse so that there may be food in my house and test me now in this, says the Lord of hosts. If I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you a blessing until it overflows, then I will rebuke the devourer for you so that it will not destroy the fruits of the ground, nor will your vine in the field cast its grapes. says the Lord of Hosts. All the nations will call you blessed, for you shall be a delightful land, says the Lord of Hosts. Your words have been arrogant against me, says the Lord. Yet you say, what have we spoken against you? You have said, it is vain to serve God, and what profit is it that we have kept his charge and that we have walked in mourning before the Lord of Hosts? So now we call the arrogant blessed. Not only are the doors of wickedness built up, but they also test God and escape. Headed the Book of Remembrance. Then those who feared the Lord spoke to one another and the Lord gave attention and heard it and a Book of Remembrance was written before him for those who fear the Lord and who esteem his name. They will be mine, says the Lord of hosts, on the day that I prepare my own possession, and I will spare them as a man spares his own son who serves him. So you will again distinguish between the righteous and the wicked, between one who serves God and one who does not serve him. And then final admonition. For behold, the day is coming. burning like a furnace, and all the arrogant and every evildoer will be chaff. And the day that is coming will set them ablaze, says the Lord of hosts, so that it will leave them neither root nor branch. But for you who fear my name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings, and you will go forth and skip about like calves from the stall. You will tread down the wicked, For they will be ashes under the soles of your feet on the day which I am preparing, says the Lord of hosts. Remember the law of Moses, my servant, even the statutes and ordinances which I commanded him in horror for all Israel. Behold, I am going to send you Elijah, the prophet before the coming of the great and terrible day of the Lord. He will restore the hearts of the fathers to their children and the hearts of the children to their fathers, so that I will not come and smite the land with a curse. That's the word of God. Amen. That's a lengthy read, and I could probably preach three or four sermons out of this. But I want you to notice three things in this reading. And by the way, I would recommend you guys go back and reread this. Yes. But first of all, God points out that, and he's talking about the nation of Israel here, but it really applies to our own nation. He said that you've turned aside from my statutes. In other words, we've turned away from listening to God. And in doing so, we've come to not respect the provision that God has provided for us. as a nation, okay? Being candid, we've become stingy with the provision that God has given us and returning a portion of it to him. But then he has some very good things to say. He's saying, but there are those of you who are getting together and you serve me. So he's writing what is called a book of remembrance. So he keeps track of what we do. And I'm sure that when we stand before God one day we'll hear about what we have done or neglected to do. And then he goes on. There's some promises in here that are great because finally the wickedness in this world will be brought to an end. And he's talking about the millennium here where he says you're going to skip about like calves from the stall. In other words, all the evil is going to be crushed, and especially Israel's enemies will be no more, and we can take heart in that. We can take heart in the promise of God, right? All right? So, we're going to continue on with our study this morning. We've come to an end of chapter six in the Gospel of John, after only after only 51 sermons, we've come through the end of chapter six, okay. And after listening to what these disciples, what they perceived to be hard sayings that these people that were following Jesus, they grumbled and they walked away. Many of them left him. They walked away with, and they walked away with empty stomachs because they were thinking that Jesus would feed them again like he had on the east side the Sea of Galilee when he preached, and that didn't happen. So they left him disappointed because they really expected these earthly things from him, and he's trying to feed them spiritual things. And they just, they're not listening. They rejected him. So then Jesus asked a question of his 12 remaining disciples, that he had, by the way, he had chosen these to follow him, and let's review a question in Simon Peter's reply. I want to go back So Jesus said to the twelve, You do not want to go away also, do you? And Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have believed and have come to know that you are the Holy One of God. And Jesus answered them, Did I myself not choose you, the twelve? And yet one of you is a devil. Now he meant Judas, the son of Simon Iscariot, for he one of the 12 was going to betray him. There's a, before we go on, there's a footnote here. The original writings of the Bible were not separated into chapters and verses, but there was a man named Stephen Langton, who was an Archbishop of Canterbury, in about 1227 AD that he started dividing the Old Testament into chapters, and then the Wycliffe English Bible was the first Bible to use chapters in 1382. Then, later, a Jewish rabbi named Nathan divided the Old Testament into verses in 1448 AD, and another man came along by the name of Stephanus, who divided the New Testament into verses in 1555 AD, beginning with the Geneva Bible. So we read chapters and verses, but it's not how it was originally written, okay? Makes it easier for us. And by the way, all that was free, okay? So let's read our text for this morning, beginning in John 7, and verses one through nine. After these things, Jesus was walking in Galilee, for he was unwilling to walk in Judea, because the Jews were seeking to kill him. Now the feast of the Jews, the feast of the booths was near. And therefore his brothers said to him, leave here and go into Judea so that your disciples may also may see your works which you are doing. For no one does anything in secret when he himself seeks to be known publicly. If you do these things, show yourself to the world. For not even his brothers were believing him. So Jesus said to them, my time is not yet come. but your time is always opportune. The world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify of it that its deeds are evil. Go up to the feast yourselves. I do not go up to this feast because my time has not yet fully come. And having said these things to them, he stayed in Galilee. Well, we find ourselves now at the beginning of the final part of Jesus' public ministry. And as our study continues through chapters 6, 7, and 8, one thing should become quite apparent, and that is the hardness of the hearts of mankind. The hardness of the heart, the rejection of the truth about the things of God, the truth about Christ, his deity, and his purpose for coming into this world. pretty apparent between chapter six, seven, and eight. Chapter seven begins, and by the way, this introduction is seven, it begins with Jesus' brothers, or more accurately, his half-brothers, mocking him in unbelief. They were aware of Jesus' signs and wonders and mercies, mercies, if you will, and his claim that he was sent by God from heaven by the Father, and yet they refused to believe even though, this is amazing, even though they grew up with him, they refused to believe what he was saying and what he was teaching, his claims. And after his brothers leave for Jerusalem to attend the feast, then Jesus goes to Jerusalem later, but also secretly, and he goes to the temple and begins teaching in the temple. But there's a division among the people about Jesus, and some having believed, and many against him. of the Pharisees and Sadducees hated him, and they wanted to silence him. And by the way, they wanted to silence him permanently. And so they arranged for his arrest. But to the dismay of these religious authorities, the Pharisees, to their dismay, the arresting officers failed to arrest him. And when they returned, they asked about that and said, we've never heard a man speak like this before. So they did not arrest him at that time. So the division over Jesus among the people continued even among the Pharisees because then Nicodemus stood up and he made an appeal on behalf of Jesus for due process. And you see that in John 7, 51. So the other Pharisees objected to Nicodemus' appeal and they wanted to ignore their own law because of their arrogance and their spiritual blindness. So chapter six through eight established beyond a doubt Jesus's words in John 665. His words established beyond a doubt and he was saying in 665, for this reason I have said to you that no one can come to me unless it has been granted him from the father. So it's unknown exactly how much time expired now between the end of chapter six and chapter seven. There's a time that went by probably about five or six months, because according to John 6, 4, it says, now the Passover, the Feast of the Jews, was near. And about five months later, the Feast of the Tabernacles happens, which, by the way, is the Feast of the Booze, same thing, same name. So let's begin here in verse one. Verse one again, after these things, Jesus was walking in Galilee for he was unwilling to walk in Judea because the Jews were seeking to kill him. Now the Feast of the Jews, the Feast of Booze, was near. So we see that there's a time that has expired here, about five months or so, maybe six. So after the things that John recorded in chapter six, Jesus continued his ministry in and around Galilee along with his 12 disciples. And Passover, which takes place in April, had come and gone. And they spent the summer walking around city to city, teaching the people around and even beyond Galilee. And now October is approaching, and the time is arriving for the Feast of the Booths. Feast of Tabernacles. So John's not specific about where Jesus walked, okay? John just says that he walked around. But Mark 7, verse 24 informs us that Jesus went north, okay? He went north from Galilee to Tyre. And on your tables you have a map, and it's not a real clear map. Okay, north of Galilee, okay. And we see then, then he went to Sidon, it's another 25 miles north. And Tyre is where Jesus was approached by this Gentile woman. She happened to be a Syrophoenician race, and the woman pleaded with him to cast the demon out of her daughter. And there's a conversation that took place But what happened finally is Jesus commented on such a great faith that she had, and he, as he spoke to her, without ever even visiting his daughter, or her daughter, he cast that demon out of her daughter. So she was very grateful her daughter had been healed. And then after that, Jesus healed a deaf man in Sudan. So he's really getting around. Matthew 16, 13. informs us that Jesus walked then to Caesarea Philippi, which is another 25 miles from Sedan. You can see that on your map. And then back down to the region of Decapolis, which is an area of about 10 cities on the southeastern part of Galilee. Another 70 miles from Caesarea Philippi. So between the five or six months between the Feast of Booze, or before the Feast of Booze, John mentioned in verse two, Jesus and his disciples may have walked somewhere around 250 miles ministering to people. Can you imagine walking barefoot 250 miles? Or maybe with a set of sandals? That's why they used to wash one another's feet. Anyway, about these feasts, I previously mentioned that the Feast of Booths is also known as the Feast of Tabernacles, and in Leviticus 23, the Old Testament, God commands seven feasts to be observed during the year, with three of them being of very special importance. Passover is one, the Feast of Unleavened Bread, and the Feast of Booths. Those three are of special importance. And in Deuteronomy, Chapter 16 and verses 16 and 17, the prophet here writes, he's taking God's instructions here. Three times in a year, all your males shall appear before the Lord your God in the place which he chooses, at the feast of unleavened bread, and at the feast of wheat, and the feast of booze, and they shall not appear before the Lord empty-handed. Verse 17. Every man shall give as he is able according to the blessings of the Lord your God, which he has given you. Notice God's command here. Everything we have, everything we have has been blessed with and has been given to us by who? God, right? Somebody's gonna say, well, no, no, I worked hard for what I have. Yes, and he gave you the ability to work. He gave you the intelligence to work and the hands to work with. Everything that we have comes from Him. So then somebody is going to be thinking, well, the verse 17 you quoted is for those Jewish males, not for Christians. We'll refer back to Romans 11. Remember studying Romans? Some of you were here. And Paul refers to the Gentile believers as branches of a wild olive tree, and the unbelieving Jews as branches broken off of the cultivated olive tree, which is a symbol of Israel. In Romans 11, 17, I'm gonna read this to you again, from 17 through 21 and then 24. This is out of Romans now. But if some of the branches were broken off and you, being a wild olive, were grafted in among them and became partaker among them of the rich fruit of the olive tree, Do not be arrogant toward the branches, but if you are arrogant, remember that is not you who supports the root, but the root supports you. You will say that branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in. Quite right. They were broken off for their unbelief, but you stand by your faith. Do not be conceited, but fear. For if God did not spare the natural branches, he will not spare you either. In verse 24, For if you were cut off from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these who are the natural branches be grafted into their own olive tree? So he's saying here that there'll be a time when the unbelieving Jews that are left will be grafted back in, they will come to faith. So the root of the cultivated olive tree, what is he talking about here? Well, it consists of Jesus and the patriarchs. That's the root of this olive tree. The patriarchs, who are they? Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And Paul explains that as believing Gentiles, we have become partakers with them. Partakers of that rich fruit of the olive tree, that symbol of Israel. Do you ever think about that? that God has drafted every true believing Gentile into that olive tree of Israel. In other words, he's made us partakers with the believers in Israel. Does that sound amazing? That kind of sink in, let that sink in. Paul goes on to say that in God's timing and by his mercy, all of Israel will be saved. Now, there's an interesting statistic recently researched, and we read about this in Malachi. And I'm applying this now to our nation. A recent statistic is that giving in American churches amounts to 2.5% of income. What is a tithe? A tithe is 10%. And God has called us to faith in Jesus Christ, forgiveness of our sins, saved us, given us eternal life in his kingdom, and across this nation, we thank God by giving him 2.5% of our income. Now, some faithfully tithe, and that raises the overall to 4.5%. Consider that as you remember how God has poured out his mercy on you and bless you with faith and forgiveness and eternal life. And he is provided for everything you possess. God spoke through the prophet Zechariah about the Feast of Booths. And perhaps you're going to find this interesting since we will all participate one day in the feast during the millennial reign with Christ. Does that sound amazing? Again, we will all participate in that feast in the millennial reign. Zechariah also describes the fate of Israel's enemies in this passage. I want to read out of Zechariah 14, verse 9, 12, and then 16 and 17. Beginning in verse 9, it says, and the Lord will be king over all the earth. And in that day, the Lord will be the only one in his name, the only one. Now this will be the plague with which the Lord will strike all the peoples who have gone to war against Jerusalem. Their flesh will rot while they stand on their feet, and their eyes will rot in their sockets, and their tongue will rot in their mouth. That's a little rough, isn't it? That's God's wrath. But it may be that Zechariah is describing here a nuclear attack. We can't be sure, but that may be what he's describing. There is presently a whole lot of applause in our universities and colleges for the enemies of Israel by supposedly educated people, and that they remain totally ignorant of the history of Israel and its God. They refuse to recognize it. But their ignorance of God's word and Israel's history is really appalling, but God's justice will come. Verses 16 and 17, 2nd Raya goes on. Then it will come about that anyone or any who are left of all the nations that were against Jerusalem will go up from year to year to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, and celebrate the Feast of Booths. And it will be that whichever of the families of the earth does not go up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, there will be no rain on them. I wonder if some liberal will then complain about climate change. And taxes again, right? So let's return to the text here. After this time of ministry, Jesus' unbelieving brothers now challenge him. In verse three, therefore his brothers said to him, Leave here and go into Judea so that your disciples may also see your works, which you are doing, for no one does anything in secret when he himself seeks to be known publicly. If you do these things, show yourself to the world. And then verse five, for not even his brothers were believing in him. You see here, they were kind of challenging him. They were mocking him a little bit. We don't believe you, but if you're gonna do these things, go up and show yourself publicly. Maybe you'll make a fool of yourself. The question is, who were Jesus' brothers, actually half-brothers? Well, according to Matthew 13 and verse 55, they were James and Joseph and Simon and Judas, or Jude, okay? That's another Judas. And according to Mark, chapter three and verse 21, his own brothers were saying this, what? He's lost his senses. He's crazy, he's insane. So now in verse four, Jesus' brothers in their present state of unbelief challenge him, go show yourself to the world. So they were hoping he would fail and make a fool of himself, or did they hope to finally settle the issue, was Jesus really the son of God, come down from heaven or not? Is this who he really is or not? Let him perform in front of the Jewish religious leaders in Jerusalem. Is he insane or not? Let them decide. So Jesus' brother's unbelief, however, soon changed to an unshakable faith in their brother, but not until after his crucifixion, resurrection, and then his ascension. If you turn to Acts for a moment, Acts 1, verses 12 to 14, Now this is after his ascension, and then they returned to Jerusalem from the Mount called Olivet, which is near Jerusalem, a Sabbath day's journey away. And when they had entered the city, they went to the upper room where they were staying, that is, Peter and John and James and Andrew, Philip, Thomas, Bartholomew, and Matthew, James, the son of Amphagos, and Simon the Zealot, and Judas, the son of James. Okay, so they returned, Notice there's one Judas that is missing. Judas Iscariot. So verse 14, all of these with one mind were continually devoting themselves to prayer along with the women and Mary, the mother of Jesus, and with his brothers. So they were suddenly converted. They came to faith. It was the resurrection and that ascension which they attended, convinced him that he had been right all along, that he was actually who he said he is. So they could no longer deny Jesus' claim, and their faith proved itself. Later on, James wrote, what, an epistle, which are in our New Testament, the book of James, and Jude wrote another epistle. They carry their names, James and Jude, both New Testament letters. So James became the senior pastor of the first church in Jerusalem, very large church, and the disciple of many home churches in that area. And James was the deciding factor in that council at Jerusalem where Paul and Barnabas had come down along with a lot of legalistic Jews who came up to Antioch and insisted that the Gentile men who came to faith must be circumcised to be saved. And they said, no way. So they went to Jerusalem. And here they had that counsel, and James finally decided, he said, no, the Gentile men have no need to be circumcised. Let them alone, don't put any more burden on them. So Jesus, or continuing with our text in verse six, Jesus said to them, my time is not yet here, but your time is always opportune. So his brothers at this point were still worldly, and they did things according to their own timing. but they did not, excuse me, they did not consider God's absolute sovereignty at that time and the fact that Jesus' mission on earth was to obey his father and not worry about their timing, not worry about what they had to say. So in verse seven he says, the world cannot hate you, but it hates me because I testify of it, that its deeds are evil. So the brothers could not discern the world, or they could not discern the world as He did. Why? Because they were part of it. Part of the world, they didn't see the world the way Jesus saw it. Before their conversion, they accept the world as it is. And Jesus gives irrefutable proof that its deeds are evil. So Paul wrote about this in 2 Corinthians 4, verses 3 and 4. And he writes this, beginning in verse three, 2 Corinthians. And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. Verse four, in whose case the God of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelieving so they may not see the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. So who's at work here? Is our adversary the devil? blinding those with these hardened hearts, blinding the unbelieving so they can't see. Now this is another great example of why God must intervene in the life of the individual believer, that unbeliever. God must intervene in the life of the unbeliever to awaken that spiritually dead person to new life, to the things of God. They're blinded. Can't believe. So what happens? The Holy Spirit regenerates that person. They wake up and suddenly they understand the gospel. And the light bulb comes on. Aha! I believe. I understand. Verse 8. So Jesus says, Go up to the feast yourselves. I do not go up to this feast because my time has not yet fully come. Now, according to earlier versions, such as the Vulgate Latin and Geneva Bible, the word yet or now should follow, I do not go up to this feast. Okay, so it's inserted, it's put in to this lesson because in the NASB, it's in there, but there's some Bibles where it lacks that word. In the early days of the Christian church, or the church at Rome, Jesus was accused of telling an untruth because they're reading it and saying, I'm not gonna go up to this feast because my time has not fully come. And they eliminated that word yet. So when you add that word yet, So now in there, then when he decides to go up later, it's because he planned it. He didn't lie about it. So as we will read next week, Jesus chose to go to the feast about three or four days later, and he ended up going to the temple and teaching. In verse nine, it says, having said these things to them, he stayed in Galilee. So we have a conclusion here. decide here. Jesus' hard sayings or teachings, plus the fact that he testified that the world, meaning the world system governed and occupied by fallen people, that world is polluted and evil, evil deeds. Therefore, the world hated him and the world still hates him. The world hates him today. It's evident that those who follow him and those who have committed their lives to him, teaching and preaching his gospel, are also hated by those who refuse to believe. If you don't believe that, try making some comments on Facebook someday and see what kind of responses you get. I showed one to Evelyn one day several years ago. Ogall replied and said, oh, you're just a hook-nosed Zionist. Okay. So what? We didn't get mad about that, laughed about it. I ticked off the good humor, man. Anyway, there's an observation here. In some of our American churches, there seems to be an aversion to the idea of being hated for the sake of Jesus Christ. Instead, what happens? There are some who, while claiming to be Christians, want the world to love them. Churches right here in Reno, I know of one in particular, where they want the world to love them. It's all love. It's okay. No matter what you do, how you live, you're okay. God loves you. As a result, Some of these churches bow to the seeker-sensitive movement, attempt to be more like the world so that, what, in some way, they can win over believers. Or win over unbelievers, rather. They scheme all kinds of attractions, pop music, drama, humor, entertainment, unbiblical opinions, topics to speak about, just so they can win some to help support the church. Or maybe I should call that an organization that reflects the world. There's a difference in the churches, and if you see this church ever drifting away from preaching the gospel, the full gospel, you better stand up and guard it. Okay? Stand up and guard it. Somebody comes in and tries to tell us, what? You're not teaching the gospel. Here's the gospel you should be preaching. Stand up and guard it. It's up to every one of us to do that. They scheme up all these attractions. 1 John 2.15 says this. Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. That's hard saying, isn't it? Do not love the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him. There's a lot of stuff out in the world that's really attractive, isn't there? Temptations of all kinds. And God created the world, and we certainly appreciate the beauty of the world, but there's a lot of stuff in the world system that we are to avoid, cast out, run from. The Christian's job, okay, is to present to all who will listen the truth about God and his Christ. That's the Christian's job. That's why he leaves us here after salvation. The truth about God, how God sees them, not how they see themselves, but how God sees them, that's the truth we're to give. And the truth also about the world itself, that its deeds are evil. And that makes us either hated or loved. Isn't that amazing? We can either be hated or loved, depending on the reception that we have, how the message is received. Coming to faith in Christ and repentance of sins itself, that's God's job, that's the Spirit's job. We cannot save anyone, but we do have that obligation and responsibility to carry the message of Jesus Christ to the world. What they do with it is up to them and it's up, of course, to the Holy Spirit. Amen? Amen. Okay. Let us pray. Our Father, we truly thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ and this, the journey that he's, we're in right now around Galilee and ministering to so many people, healing people, performing signs and wonders. And he's dealing with a lot of unbelief and a lot, and then some who believe and follow him. And we pray that Jesus's ministry sets an example for us that we can follow, that we, as an assembly and individually, that we carry the message of Jesus Christ, the gospel of Christ, into this world and into this valley, that we become that light in this community. And we give you thanks for that help in Jesus.