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Take your Bibles and turn with
me to the book of Galatians, chapter five. I know I scared you to
death when I told you I had a long message today. He said, if what you normally do
is not long, then what are we in for? No. I'm also trying something new
because of the way we have this cord, it plugs into the left
side of my computer, so I put my computer on this side of my
Bible over here. So this may blow my brain this morning trying
to learn something new. So, Lord willing, things will
go well up here. We're looking at Galatians chapter
five, verse 19 to 21, continuing to talk about the lusts of the
flesh. We're going to set the stage,
continuing as we go through this, for thinking of the fruit of
the spirit, which truly is Christ. He is the epitome of all of the
fruits of the Spirit. And so as we think of Christmas,
we'll really be tying in those thoughts of love, joy, peace,
which are the fruit of the Spirit, which are all truly incarnated
in the person and work of Christ. But we're still going through
this grueling part of the book. And if you thought last week
was grueling, perhaps this will be no better as we look at two
more sins on this list of the lusts of the flesh. Notice with
me in Galatians chapter five. Let's start reading in verse
19. We'll read through verse the
end of verse 21. Now, the works of the flesh are
evident. And these are adultery, fornication and cleanness, lewdness.
idolatry and sorcery, hatreds, contentions, jealousies, outbursts
of wrath, selfish ambitions, dissensions, heresies, envy,
murders, drunkenness, revelries, and the like of which I tell
you beforehand, just as I told you in time past, that those
who are practicing these things will not inherit The kingdom
of God, one of the things we may mention of is, you know,
any believer can fall into one of these things, but we will
come out of them by the grace of God. God will bring them forth
out of them. These will not be sins that characterize the life
of a believer. They are characteristic sins
of those who do not know Christ, but they are telling us what
is truly in us and what we must guard against as we seek to walk
in the spirit. Would you look with me to the
Lord and Lord of Prayer as we were singing, Joy came forward
and just asked that we would also remember to pray. And I
think this is important for the students there in Casper with
that murder-suicide there on the campus. And I think as we
pray, let's remember that the Lord will work in their midst
there on that campus, even in this tragic situation. So let's
go to the Lord and Lord of Prayer and then we'll jump into the
message this morning. Lord, we are reminded of the nature that
we have received from Adam because of his rebellion when he took
of the fruit and he ate it. And Father, you had told him
and his dear wife Eve in advance that the day that they would
do that, they would be plunged into death. So, Father, every
one of us is born with this nature of death. that inhabits our bosom. And Father, we thank You for
the Spirit of God in whom we can walk and live and have our
being because of what Christ did for us. And Father, as we
identify these issues and as we look at them under the microscope
of Your Word, I pray that, Father, You would help us as believers
that these things would be being shed from our life like perhaps
a snake sheds its skin. And then, father, if there's
someone in our midst that is not a believer and some of these
things are characteristic of their life, that your spirit
would point to them their need and their brokenness and point
to them Christ as a sufficient payment for their sin. Lord,
meet with us this morning, we pray in Jesus name. Amen. We're looking at Galatians chapter
five. We've been talking about different categories of sin as
they are enumerated here. There are four categories. Last
week, we talked about sexual sin. We looked at these four
things that are listed in the text, adultery, fornication,
uncleanness and lewdness. Today, we're going to be looking
at false worship. There are also sins of relationship
that are enumerated here. Things like envy and selfish
ambitions, maybe more respectable sins amongst believers. Nevertheless, damnable sins,
aren't they? And then we'll also talk about
addictive things, things like drunkenness and revelries. And
so we're looking at these categories. We talked about sexual sin last
week, and that was a grueling message. One of the things I
want to remind you of, I want to point you young ladies to
something before we move on. You young ladies that are in
our marriage, you know, we live in an age where the tide of this world
would sweep you into immoral behavior by young men who may
come into your life and say, you know, if you don't do this
with me, then you don't really love me. Well, we talked about
last week that true love waits and true love is worth waiting
for. And in Proverbs 31, we have this
tremendous verse where it tells us, you know, charm is deceitful
and beauty is fading. But a woman who fears the Lord,
She shall be praised. Young woman, don't just buy into
all the world's glamour models and glamour magazines. Buy in
during this time in your life into building godly character
that will then bring into your life the godly young man that
God wants for you to have. Same goes true for you young
men. I just want to draw our attention to that verse this
morning. Today, we're talking about false worship. There are
two things that are listed here. They are idolatry. and sorcery. I put the Greek words there for
you again, you can even see in the word idolatry in the Greek
language, you can even see the word idolatry, the word in the
English language is almost a transliteration, the word sorcery, pharmakeia.
You can hear the word pharmacy there, pharmaceutical. We'll
talk about that this morning, what this means, this Greek concept
of sorcery and pharmakeia. So what we're going to do is
just like we did last week, we're going to define these concepts,
going through them one at a time. We're going to look at some scriptural
illustrations of what these things are, and then we're going to
bring it down to that gut level grueling place of making some
present day application. And looking at some danger areas,
we've been talking about how, yes, we all have a sinful nature,
but there are three enemies of every believer, the world system,
the devil. These two are external to us.
And then we also struggle with our internal flesh and the devil
and the world system conspire against us and allure our flesh
from us. So we need to talk about danger
areas. lest we would fall prey and these
things would crop up out of our lives, even as Christians, even
as believers, we must guard against these things. And we'll look
at some specific places where believers fell prey to these
types of behaviors and how God dealt with them in those specific
situations. Now, when we think of these two
words, they are kind of related in a similar way to fornication
and adultery. Fornication is a very broad term
which speaks of sexual immorality. Adultery speaks of a specific
type of sexual immorality. Idolatry is a broad term which
speaks of false worship in the New Testament and in the Old
Testament. Specifically false worship that utilized a visualization
of God. But that is a general term. Whereas
sorcery is more of a specific type of idolatry. And so almost that same kind
of relationship. Now, as we talk about idolatry,
let's try to come up with a working definition in our mind. When
we think of idolatry, we are thinking about the substitution
of a visual thing in worship. which then steals our adoration
and our praise. There is this visual substitution
that then becomes the recipient of our adoration and praise.
A guy named Robert Newell. who was once a president of Moody
Bible Institute, wrote a commentary on the book of Revelation. In
his appendix, he has an appendix that deals with idolatry. And
I want to give you the definitions according to Robert Newell, and
I think they are helpful as we think about what idolatry is.
Robert Newell says this, idolatry is man's placing a visible object
of worship before his eyes. to protect him from the one true
God, thus silencing his conscience in order that he may indulge
his lust. So think of that. It is a substitution. It is him substituting a replacement
God in order to silence his conscience. The conscience that cries out
to him that there is a true God. He goes on to say this idolatry
is man's deliberate, determined, putting away from his thoughts
the concept of a holy God and choosing to change that concept
for a God that will not judge sin and setting up an image of
that concept, a likeness to himself. Thus, eliminating God. You know, we live in an age today
where atheism is kind of on the rise, so to speak. But you and
I both know that only very few men can really be true atheists,
can silence their conscience to the degree where they are
willing to say there is no God. Very few men will be willing
to take that step. So what do most men do? They
live in direct denial of God by another means. Not by denying
that there is a God, but by simply perverting who that one true
God is. And so they put a substitute
in his place and concoct or construct a God in our own image. Thus, even in the scriptures,
God condemns Israel in Psalm 50, verse 21. God says to Israel,
you thought that I was altogether like you. You thought that I
was altogether like you, they had constructed a God in their
own image and they had subverted and perverted who the one true
God truly is. So when we think of idolatry,
let's think, run through the Bible real quickly. You know,
there is no record in the Bible of idolatry prior to the flood.
There's violence, there's mayhem and murder, and there's immorality,
but there's no record of idolatry. Now, there is false worship through
Cain. OK, but there's no idolatry in that specific sense that is
mentioned. The first idolatry that is mentioned
is really mentioned concerning Babel or the Tower of Babel. In fact, the Book of Revelation
tells us that Babel is the mother of these harlotries. and of these
abominations. And so the Tower of Babel was
like an ancient ziggurat that was constructed for false worship,
and it combined elements of sacrifice and sorcery and astrology. A man named Selwyn Stevens, who
has a PhD, wrote a book called The New Age. old lies in a new
package. He has this to say about Babylon.
Let's just listen to what he says. He says Nimrod, who was
the ruler of Babel, when you go back to the book of Genesis,
Nimrod had his people build a number of ziggurats, temple towers,
for religious purposes. They were claimed to be staircases
from earth to heaven, and they were used for satanic worship
and occultic initiation. The best known was at Babylon.
It was called the Platform of Heaven and Earth. Josephus, the
Jewish Roman historian, recorded. It was Nimrod who said that he
would be he would be revenged upon God if he should have a
mind to drown the world again. He would build a tower too high
for the waters to be able to reach and that he would avenge
himself on God for destroying their forefathers. Nimrod rebelled
against God. He determined to lead the people
away from him together with his wife Semiramis. Nimrod created
most of what we know today as a cultism, including witchcraft,
astrology, blood sacrifice, and much more. Nimrod required human
sacrifice by fire, particularly of children. The overwhelming
evidence is that Nimrod, Semiramis, and many other Priestly leaders
were involved in direct satanic control and contact. And so this
is where this all begins. These concepts of idolatry. Now,
I want you to go with me in your thinking to the book of Exodus
chapter 20. You can go there if you want,
but you don't have to. I'm not going to give you the time really to turn there.
But in Exodus chapter 20, God addresses idolatry specifically
in the Ten Commandments. He says, you shall have no other
gods in my presence. There will be no other gods before
me. You shall not make for yourself a carved image, any likeness
of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth
beneath, or that is in the water that is under the earth. You
shall not bow down to them, nor serve them. For I, the Lord,
am a jealous God." Notice what God says specifically about these
sins of idolatry. And I visit the iniquity of the
fathers upon the children to the third and the fourth generation
of these idolatrous peoples who hate Me, but showing mercy to
the thousands who love Me and keep My commandments. And so
here we have in the Decalogue, God condemning and saying how
abhorrent idolatry is to himself. In the historical books of the
Bible, in the Old Testament, we have the story of Israel's
continuing syncretism with these pagan religions that surround
them. I want to put this word up, syncretism,
because we're going to talk about it off and on for the next few
minutes. Syncretism is what Israel fell prey to. They did not become
blatantly idolatrous. They merely combined many of
the pagan practices with their own. And God says, I hate that.
It's called syncretism. The word is a Greek word which
literally means to combine. And so what they were doing was
they were taking portions of pagan religions and combining
them with revealed truth that God had given them. The most
blatant illustration of this is at Mount Sinai when Aaron
makes a golden calf. You remember the people come
to him and they say, we don't know what happened to Moses. He's been up on the
mountain for 40 days. And they want to have a mutiny. So Aaron
says to him, take off all your gold and bring it to me and I
will make an idol. And he makes this idol. It is
a golden calf. And he says to the people of
Israel, this is your God that brought you out of Egypt. And
then he makes this statement. Tomorrow we will have a feast
to Jehovah. Now, what has he done there?
He has syncretized pagan worship in a golden calf and he has basically
named it the worship of Jehovah. And God says, I hate that. And
God judged them for it. And so we have syncretistic practice. And you know what happened there
at Mount Sinai? We have idolatry, but we also have immorality combined
with it. It is interesting to note that
there's a direct corollary between those two things. The more idolatrous
a people become, the more immoral they become with it. Those two
things always are in connection in the Scripture. They're even
in connection here in Galatians chapter 5. He does not separate
them far in the list. They're almost combined. In the
prophetic books, we have the thus saith the Lord against the
idolatry. We have condemnation. We have
chastening and judgment recorded that God will bring upon his
people for their idolatry and for their syncretism. And so,
in Isaiah chapter 47, God says to Israel, keep on with your
magic spells. Keep on with your sorcery. These
things that you have labored in since your childhood. Let
your astrologers save you. And God judges his people because
they have continued in this idolatry. Now, it's interesting in the
book of Acts. The book of Acts is a record of the gospel's progression
from Jerusalem to Judea, to Samaria, to the pagan peoples of the world.
And we really have this question coming up repeatedly in the book
of Acts. How do pagan peoples shed their
pagan beliefs and their practices and not syncretize them with
Christian beliefs? And this is what we have truly
seen many times in Christian history, is there's this attempt
to combine or reconcile elements of paganism with Christian thought. Now, the Jerusalem Council addressed
that in Acts 15, when they write a letter to the Gentile believers.
It says, we're not going to put you under the ceremonial law.
The Holy Spirit has said, you do not need to be under the ceremonial
law. But they say, we want you to do these things. The Spirit
says, you must abstain from things offered to idols, from blood,
from things that are strangled, and from sexual immorality. And
then they say, if you keep yourselves from these things, you will do
well. Now, there are three chapters
in the book of Corinthians that are devoted to the subject of
idolatry. First Corinthians, chapter 8, 9 and 10. In chapter
8, Paul begins by saying, we know that an idol is nothing
in the world. Paul said almost the same thing in Galatians 4,
verse 8, when he said, But then indeed, when you did not know
God, you served those who by nature are not gods. They're
not really true gods. This was Elijah's point when
he's up on Mount Carmel. Baal couldn't hear their prayers.
It didn't matter how long they danced. It didn't matter how
long they cut themselves. Baal was not a true god. Idols,
by nature, are not true gods. And yet, Paul says in chapter
10, we need to recognize something. That is, idols are fronts for
demonic activity. And so Paul says in 1 Corinthians
chapter 10, the things that the Gentiles sacrifice They do not
sacrifice to idols. They sacrifice them to demons. And he says, and I would have
you not to have fellowship with demons. And so Paul's prevailing
advice to the Christians in that setting was flee from idolatry,
have nothing to do with it. Now, let's transition. Let's
move on from here. What is sorcery? We've talked
about idolatry. We've kind of defined it. We've
looked at some biblical illustrations. Let's talk about sorcery and
kind of do the same. What is this? Sorcery basically
includes three things. When you think of sorcery and
we read about it in the scripture, we will see many times different
things included in it. First of all, pharmakeia. Think of the word pharmakeia,
drug, literally what that word means. And in the ancient world
and even today, Parts of the world, there is an attempt to
use drugs, which would then induce a trance like state and usher
the person into the kind of communion with their God. And so, sorcery
was the use of drugs to induce spiritual experience. Now, we
can think of even in the United States of America, how Indians,
the Indian culture was using, I think you call it peyote. And
we're trying to use that thing for the same type thing. We can
think of the ghost dance. We can think of, you know, medicine
men. We can even think of other parts
of the world of witch doctors and these attempts to create
a spiritual experience through the use of drugs. Boy, that sounds
like the 60s, doesn't it? An LSD. Some of you came out
of that culture. Secondly, sorcery. Sorcery was
an attempt to use craft. Notice that word craft. We'll
use that word later in the message, but craft to foretell the future
or to try to manipulate things in the present. So you would
maybe cast a spell on your neighbor's crops. You're manipulating the
present circumstances. And so it was an attempt to either
be able to foretell what was going to happen in the future,
or it was an attempt to manipulate the present through magic and
those types of things. The third thing that is true
in sorcery is it is also a system of paganism that is tied to idolatrous
practice in general. And so we think of things like
what they call the ancient arts. The craft. And then even today,
where we're going to apply this later, things like Wiccan. And
what is Wiccan? Now, in the Scripture, God says
some things about these. We'll go through this. I want
you to notice in Exodus chapter 22, verse 18, this was God's
statement concerning these things in the in the Deuteronomic law.
In Exodus 22, verse 18, he says, You shall not permit one who
does these things to live. Notice what he also says in the
book of Deuteronomy, in chapter 18, verse 9 to 12. He says, when
you come into the land which the Lord your God is giving you,
you shall not learn to follow the abominations of these nations. There shall not be found among
you anyone who makes his son or daughter pass through the
fire. That was the worship of a specific God in Israel, the
God Molech. I put it in italics because that's
not really in the text. I just substituted it there or
inserted it there so you could see what this was all about.
There shall not be found among you any who makes his son or
his daughter pass through the fire. He also says, or one who
practices witchcraft. Or a soothsayer? Or one who interprets
omens? Or a sorcerer? One who conjures
spells? Or a medium? Man, you can go
to late night TV and see a lot of mediums today on TV. Or a
spiritist? Or one who calls up the dead?
For all who do these things are an abomination of the Lord, and
because of these abominations, the Lord your God drives them out
before you. My friend, young kid, if you go to a fair and there
is a fortune teller there dressed up, it's not a cute thing to
play with. Don't even go in the tent. These are God's remarks
concerning these types of behaviors. Now, let's think about the scriptures.
Let's get a look at some examples of it. These things permeated
the courts of ancient kings. In Exodus chapter 2, in Pharaoh's
court, Jannes and Jambres, talks about them and Timothy, were
able to conjure spirits, were able to duplicate some of the
miraculous plagues that Moses was doing. In Daniel chapter
2, I didn't want to spell out Nebuchadnezzar, so we called
him Nebi this morning. Nebi's court. Think of Daniel
chapter 2. It's interesting. Even the Magi
who come to worship Christ found connection back to Nebuchadnezzar's
court. We won't take time to develop
that this morning. But even the wrath of men shall
praise him. Even the foolishness of men shall
eventually, every knee shall bow before him. So, you know,
the Magi, going back to that. We could talk about Daniel and
how he probably separated himself from those practices and inserted
a whole school of thought into the court that was very biblical
in its orientation. Thus, these men knew the prophecies
of Jeremiah. Second Chronicles, King Manasseh specifically made
his son pass through the fire, sacrificed his son to Molech. In Acts chapter 8, we have Simon
the sorcerer in Samaria, specifically called that. We won't develop
that story this morning. And Peter dealt with him. In Acts
13, we have Elymas in Paphos, who is also connected to the
proconsul, the Roman governor, Sergius Paulus. And Paul deals
with Elymas, who is a sorcerer. In Acts chapter 17, we have a
damsel who is enslaved. And she is a soothsayer. And
she is following Paul and Silas around the town. And Paul gets
tired of her coming behind. He turns around one day and he
casts the demon out of her. Boy, the people who owned her
were not excited because they lost a ton of money. And they
begin to persecute Paul because of specifically dealing with
this woman, this young damsel who is a soothsayer. So these
things permeate the Scripture as well as the ancient world.
In the first century world, the pagan mystery religions – we
talked about that last week a little bit – were hotbeds of occultic
worship and practice. And these things dominated the
lives of people in the Roman Empire. Now, empire worship unified
everyone under a state system of worship. But it was really
just a system of lip service, worship and obeisance to the
Roman state. And as long as you did that,
you went through the kind of the farce of doing it, of worshipping
the emperor, then you could worship any god you wanted to. And so
in every locality, they preserved a worship of a God in a form
of worship in the temples that had been erected in the honor
of these deities. And so they were like these dueling
deities in the ancient world in their mindset. And so it was
a pantheistic and a polytheistic system. There were many gods
and they were always attached to nature. So think of the Greek
gods. When you study them in mythology,
they were always attached to nature. And they would combine
in these religions bizarre initiatory rites with blatant immoral practices. And there was these mystery religions
to Serapis and Mithra. Aphrodite and Corinth. We talked
about that last week. And the temple prostitution that
was involved in that. Diana in Ephesus. And these religions
plunged people into satanic darkness and into bondage. I mean, this
was a horrible system under which to live. And only the Gospel
of Jesus Christ had the power to free them. And that is why
Paul says in Colossians 1, He has delivered us from the power
of darkness. He has delivered us. He has set
us free. And He has transferred us into
the kingdom of the Son of His love. And so as the gospel spread
in Europe, it found peoples in similar religious practices everywhere
it went. Prior to the Christianization
of Europe, the Gauls, the Celts, the Picts, the Druids, all of
these people were heavily influenced by these types of practices. And today, these practices are
united in belief systems like Wicca and the New Age. And so this leads us to today. Let's talk about the danger areas.
Let's talk about where we live today when you turn on your TV. It is interesting to note that
as Christianity has receded in influence in our country, in
its place, paganism has correspondingly arisen from the ashes, so to
speak. And once again, it is exerting
influence in our country. Now, we're as Christians, if
the Lord tarries and Emmanuel does not come this year or next. If the Lord tarries, we will
face pressure once again dealing with syncretistic systems. We even have it today, so you
can go to many churches today and on Monday night instead of
bingo, they have Christian yoga. Syncretism, Hindu practice with
a Christian name. Now, we're not just talking about
relaxation. and even biblical meditation,
we are talking about religious practice. Study it out. We've
got to be careful of these syncretistic systems. Now, as we think about
this, let's talk a little bit this morning about these things
specifically, idolatry and sorcery. I don't know if you realize this,
I sure did not. Did you realize that Wicca, according to many,
Now, it's difficult to gauge this, undoubtedly, because you
can't go to a Wiccan church and find out their membership role.
Many of these things are rather secretive, and many of these
things are also on a level where maybe teenagers don't want to
tell mom and dad they're a part of these things. So it's difficult
to gauge exactly how much influence. But according to many, Wicca
is America's fastest growing religion. It is stated that within
10 years it will become the third largest religion in the United
States of America behind Christianity. Christianity, we're talking about
a very broad umbrella there, just Christendom. So we're going
to involve in that maybe Jehovah's Witnesses, we're going to include
in that Roman Catholicism, Mormonism, many other parts of what we think
of Christendom. But it will still be third behind
Christianity and Islam. There are more than 200,000 registered
witches in the U.S. and 8 million practitioners of
the craft. If you go to Amazon and you type
in witchcraft books, you will find 4,180 titles. If you type in occult books,
you will find in the neighborhood of over 6,000. These things are
growing exponentially in their place within our culture. According
to Witch School, which trains many of these teachers, On their
website, they say this, there is such a rapid spiritual reorientation
in America that the needs for thousands of Wiccan teachers
over the course of the next decade will be required to meet the
demand. So this is the seminary of witchery,
according to George Barner. How many of you heard of George
Barner? Probably most of us have. George Barner is kind of the
guru of Christian statistics. In research he has done, he has
found that this environment for growth of pagan occultic practice
has been set, that environment has been set by different things. And I'll give them to you. He
gives us four things. Number one on his list is this. The
fascination that adolescents and teens have with casting spells,
performing magic, being an integral part of a small group of like-minded
people, a club, and the opportunity for creative expression accompanied
by the promise of the demonstration of power. Secondly, the highly
individualistic nature of the faith. Thirdly, its sensitivity
to nature and the environment, the environmental movement. And
then lastly, moral ambivalence towards codes of conduct. In
other words, in witchery and in these practices, there is
no specific code of conduct against any type of immorality. It's
not about morality. Whatever feels good to you is
okay. Now, perhaps you're sitting there
asking yourself, what in the world is Wiccan? Did you know
that we now have Wiccan chaplains in the military? In many states,
Wiccans can perform weddings and Wicca is an organized, recognized
religion. Now, when we think of Wicca,
we don't want to think of Snow White, seven dwarves, nor do
we want to think of the Wizard of Oz. Here's a basic synopsis
by Barna of what Wicca is. I'll read it to you and then
we'll move along. Wicca is a faith system that
has no central organization or theological belief system that
is defined for all of its adherents. It may be best understood through
its typical practices, which include performing magic and
sorcery, casting spells and engaging in witchcraft. It is a ritualistic
faith based on a loose set of pagan beliefs. that are generally
pantheistic in nature. Those who are involved commonly
go through initiation rites for membership. Contrary to widespread
assumption, Wicca is not synonymous with Satan worship. Now, it is
satanic in that sense, but it's not like these people are bowing
down to an effigy of Satan. It's not what we're talking about.
It is very tied to nature and the seasons and the cycles of
life. It promotes things like karma
and reincarnation, and it also promotes latitude in forms of
morality. Now, why has it grown? The first
thing I would say is the concept of spiritual vacuum. I don't
want to take the time to go there, but in Luke chapter 11, verse
24, Jesus tells a story. He says, when an unclean spirit
of a man goes from him, it wanders in the earth. It does not find
a resting place, so it returns to that man and he finds that
man, his house is put in order and the floor is swept. And so
he goes and he finds seven other spirits that are like unto him,
and they come back and they dwell within the man. And Jesus said
the latter state of the man is worse than at the beginning.
Jesus basically saying this, if there is a vacuum spiritually
in your life, something will fill it. And what is happening
in the United States of America is there is a spiritual vacuum
of truth and Satan has filled it. This has created the environment. Now, I also want to draw your
attention to Barnett's statement. The adolescent preoccupation
with spells, magic and witchery. Now, where has that preoccupation
come from? Somewhat from the flesh, because
that's within us. But it has been driven to a large
part by print and media that glamorize and glorify these things
and then appeal to our basic fleshly lusts. This is where it gets ugly when
we think about things like the Harry Potter craze. And most
lately, the Twilight Saga. These are two great examples
of how these types of things get a foothold in the life of
a young person. Now, you know me, I am no guru
on pop American culture, so I do some learning. By the way, I
noticed in the paper this week, the latest installment of Twilight
is now showing locally, so this is very pertinent. I didn't even
really know much about what that was. It's interesting. Many, many Christian leaders
have voiced huge concern with Twilight, it's not just me, in
fact. Even Mark Driscoll, who comes
from like what we would think of as more of an emergent brand
of Christianity, even Mark Driscoll, and I'll even go to this, has
on his website, not on his website, excuse me, on YouTube, you should
be discerning about Twilight. He has a 10 minute expose on
what Twilight is. This is Mark Driscoll. He's not
what you would think of as me. He's more of an emergent brand
of Christianity, although I believe he's a believer in everything
else. I'm not denigrating him in any way. So many people, in
fact, you know what he says in this right almost at the beginning?
And I would encourage you, if you want to do a little bit more
on this tonight in the evening service, as we talk about the
book of Ezekiel, we're also going to watch this 10 minute clip
and discuss some things that are in it. So I'd encourage you
parents with young people to be here. You need to think about
these things. But one of the things he says
at the beginning of this, Because he talks about how we check our
brain at the beginning of a movie, he makes a statement, a movie
is a sermon with pictures. It's not just entertainment.
And so we'll look at it, so many Christian leaders out there are
looking at these things and saying there is danger here, my friend,
be careful. Now, my intent this morning is
not to do a full expose on the Twilight Saga, but let's just talk about
it for a minute. I read a blog by one Christian mom who was
very disconcerted. She was very disconcerted because
when her children were going to youth group, those kids were
coming home with the startling awareness, not only of Twilight,
but the reality that most of the kids within the youth group
were buying into the saga. She was very disconcerted by
that. So what is the Twilight saga? It is a series of five
romance, horror, fantasy films and books from Summon Entertainment.
Four books. They're based on four novels
by an American Mormon whose name is Stephanie Meyer. The series
has grossed two billion dollars in worldwide receipts in the
movie version. That is, my friend, third or
fourth all time. So this is huge. follows the personal romantic
relationship of a young human teenager named Bella Swan with
a vampire named Edward Cullen. And Cullen is a 104 year old. I wish I looked like that at
46. But I mean, he's the icon at 104, 104 year old vampire. So there's all these subplots
in the book and in the movies of competing vampires and werewolves
and packs and blood sucking and everything else. Not to mention
the immoral themes that run through the series. The book fantasizes
with dark themes and it opened doors. It opens doors in the
minds of kids to occultic practices. I would draw your attention to
two things in the scripture. First of all, in Colossians chapter
two, he says, beware, lest anyone would cheat you. Through philosophy
or empty deceit, according to the basic principles of the world. That phrase, the basic principles
of the world, in Galatians chapter 4, is tied specifically to idolatry. And not according to Christ.
Now, parent, if you want to think about this saga and think about
whether or not this saga fits into a Philippians 4.8 grid,
of the good, the noble, the pure things that should fill your
child's mind, just go and consider the mythology of vampires and
blood-sucking and combine it with the sensual themes of today's
entertainment and parent. Voila! You have a perfect recipe
for at the very least Christian backsliding in your child. Because these things are not
pure, nor are they good. So how do we deal with it? Let's
bring around the message to some close. How do we deal with these
things? What are we to do if we have
dabbled with it? Maybe you're a young person. You've been dabbling
with these things in your mind and fantasizing about them. And
maybe you've told no one about it. You've kept it hidden from
your parents, even. But these things are filling
your mind again, just like last week. Young person, you must
begin by running to the blood of Christ. His blood was shed
as a propitiation for all sin. We looked at that briefly last
week in first John, chapter two, verse one and two. He says, I've
written these things to you that you might not sin, but if any
man sin, we have an advocate with the Father. Jesus Christ
is righteous and you must go to the blood of Christ and find
cleansing there. I would also direct you to a
reference in the book of Acts in chapter 19. In Acts chapter
19, there is the story in Ephesus of a failed exorcism. You remember
the story and the seven sons of Sceva who try to cast out
this demon are beat up by the demon. And they leave the house
and they run out unclad. And this is what the scripture
says happened as a direct result of that failed exorcism. It says
fear fell on all the church and the name of the Lord Jesus was
magnified and many think of that word many. There were many in
the church. These were people who had believed,
it says specifically in the text, they came confessing and telling
their deeds. Also, many of them who had practiced
magic brought their books together. They burned them in the sight
of all and they counted up the value of them. And it was totaled
at 50,000 pieces of silver. That's a lot of stuff bought
on Amazon. A piece of silver is one day's wage. 50,000 of
them in this church. 50,000 days wages worth of books
is brought together to the church and they destroy them. Don't
sell them at a garage sale. Don't give them to someone else
to corrupt their mind. Take them to mom and dad and burn them.
Get rid of those things. Get them out of your life. This
is what the scripture says. I'm going to close with a story
in another verse, and I won't go into this deeply, but about
a month ago, I got a phone call late at night from a young man
who has come to Christ recently. When he was a child in our valley,
was involved in some occultic practices in the basement of
a well-known business establishment. Nine year old boy, I think it
was nine. And then he came to Christ, and these things were
continuing to haunt him. And there was like a brooding,
he told me on the phone, there was this brooding sense of darkness
and evil that was pervading his life. And he knew he was a Christian,
and he knew his sin was forgiven, but he couldn't get rid of this
stuff. What was the first thing he did? He exposed it to someone
else. He came and talked to someone else. We showed him some scripture,
prayed with him, talked with him a little bit later, a couple
of days later on the phone, said, how's it going with that thing? Man,
I feel so much better. And I point him to a verse in
1 John chapter 4 where the scripture specifically says, and John is
writing to people who have done these kinds of things. And he
says, greater is the one who is in you than the one who is
in the world. And he has delivered us from
darkness. And he has transferred us into
the kingdom of his dear son. Young person, the things you
do now, you may think they will have no effect on your life.
And they will crop up if you are not careful. You need to
banish them from you. Take them in the blood of Christ.
And so we'll close with these verses in 1 John chapter 5 with the
Apostle John's admonition. He says, we know that we are
of God. The whole world lies under the sway of the evil one.
And we know that the Son of God has come and he has given us
an understanding that we may know him who is true. And we
are in the One who is true in His Son, Jesus Christ. This is
the true God and eternal life. And John closes his book, My
little children, keep yourselves from idols. Amen. Let us close. Father, we do live
in a day and an age where In our country, it seems like there
is a permeating cloud of darkness that is growing. And it is taking
people's lives and in many cases, destroying them in a culture
of death. Father, I pray that you would
help us as believers, that we might take the gospel of Jesus
Christ to those in our community and those around us, that they
may be delivered from the power of darkness. Father, may we as
parents be discerning In teaching our children that which is good,
that which is noble, that which is pure, that we may fill our
minds and our lives with these things. Oh, Lord, there's so
much good that is in the world and there are so many good things
that we can enjoy. Father, don't let the devil steal from our
young people the good. substitute it with his lie. Lord, as we close, I pray that
if your spirit is working in the life of a young person or
even adult, that Father, perhaps they need to talk to a deacon
afterwards and they need to say, I need some help with this area.
Would you pray with me? Would you hold me accountable?
Maybe they need to go to a mom or a dad and say, mom or dad,
here's some stuff I've had. I want to get it out of my life
or to pass their matter to myself. Lord, may we mean business for
you. In Jesus' name, amen.
Twilight - The Saga of Sorcery
Series Galatians
Is paganism alive and well in America today under the guise of Wicca and New Age?
Is the church being infiltrated by a modern rise in these ancient practices?
Are our children being indoctrinated into it through environmentalism, public schools and the media?
| Sermon ID | 122121925283 |
| Duration | 49:43 |
| Date | |
| Category | Sunday Service |
| Bible Text | Deuteronomy 18:9-12; Galatians 5:19-21 |
| Language | English |
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