Welcome, it's good to see you here this evening. Glad to have you all with us. And let's get to it. This is June, so we're gonna do a little special rendition of Prophecy Update. I'm calling it Prideful Month. Prideful Month. Because that's kind of where we're at. You know, there's so many things in the scriptures that talk about the last days. And some of the ones I so love that helps us understand is when the New Testament tells us of references to the Old Testament of what to expect as we get closer to the end. Isn't it funny that what goes around comes around? I mean, you know, the Bible says, just like in these days, it's gonna be like those days, you know? And so it gives us a little bit of a hint as to if we're living in the last days. We're supposed to know not the day nor the hour of his second coming, but we do know the times and the seasons. How do we know that? Well, he gives us all kinds of evidence and all kinds of information about what the last days will look like. And I think one of those passages among many is right here in Luke chapter 17. You can turn there if you want. But in Luke 17, Of course, Jesus is giving all kinds of important teaching on a lot of different things, but also about the end of time. And it's Luke 17, verse 26 is where we'll pick it up. Luke 17, 26. It says, just as it was in the days of Noah, so shall it be in the days of the Son of Man. They were eating and drinking and marrying and being given in marriage until the day when Noah entered the ark and the flood came and destroyed them all. Likewise, just as it was in the days of Lot, they were eating and drinking, buying and selling, planting and building. But on the day when Lot went out from Sodom, fire and sulfur rained from heaven and destroyed them all. So what's the days of the coming of the Son of Man like? Well, the days of Noah, that's the first one that's brought up here. And we've done whole studies on that. We've done whole prophecy updates on what were the days of Noah. And if you recall, it was a population explosion, violence in the land, corruption. And what does that word corruption actually mean? It gives us a lot of things to think about. It wasn't just corruption as in sin, it was that too. But it was corruption as far as the genetic makeup of humanity. And if you recall that whole Genesis 6 situation with the Nephilim and the sons of God and coming into the daughters of man and all that stuff, it was quite a mysterious situation, but evil to say the least. So we've done studies on the days of Noah, what it would be like. But the second one here is also compared to the days of Lot. In the days of Lot, they were doing the same things. Now what's this thing about, what's wrong with eating and drinking? Well, there's nothing wrong with that in and of itself. They were eating and drinking. Buying and selling, is there anything wrong with that? planting and building. But on the day when Lot went out from Sodom, fire and sulfur rained." The idea is they were living their sinful lives, but just kind of going on business as usual. They thought they were perfectly normal. They could just go on their lives, their merry way, doing their own thing, not caring what God was saying or what God cared about. They were just going on life as usual, and that's really one of the things. What was the sin? Here's a question for you. And I'm gonna say, I'm gonna put it in a way that's kind of a trick question, because some of you know, some of you think you know, but I wonder if we really know. What was the sin of Sodom and Gomorrah? Are you sure about that? Are you really sure about that? It's funny because kind of pride. Yeah, Brett, I think you have the prideful month. Of course, that's what you're talking about. Well, yes, but actually there's several scriptures that tell us what the sins of Sodom and Gomorrah. And I'm gonna say it's more than just one. But you gotta understand, I think that somehow we almost become apologetic for Sodom and Gomorrah in the sense, well, it was pride that was a problem. It wasn't necessarily the homosexuality. Well, it was the homosexuality too. Would you agree with that? We know that because the Bible actually tells us that. First of all, if you just go to the story itself, It's all about these two angels that kind of disguise themselves as men that come and meet Abraham there in Genesis chapter 18. But eventually those two men, angels, make their way into Sodom. And you remember the story, those two angels go into lots. and Lot's like, man, we gotta get you off these streets. You gotta come stay at my house. Oh no, we'll stay in the streets. And Lot's like, you can't stay in the streets here in my city. Just like you, if you had a guest here in Portland, you wouldn't have them stay at Pine and Third down there in downtown for the night. You'd say, yeah, you better come over to my house. Same thing. But that's what's going on. Lot's like, oh, you don't wanna hang out out here. So he gets him in the house, and you know the story. All the men, young and old, from the city came and beat down the door saying, let us in. We want to have sexual relations with those two men that are in your house. And it was a horrible, horrible situation. It was more than just homosexuality. It was rape. And then Lot offers his daughters. It's a horrible, horrible story. But we see that the Lord informed Abraham that he was gonna basically, you can jot this in your notes, Genesis chapter 18, verse 20, the Lord says that the quote, the outcry of Sodom and Gomorrah is so great and their sin is so grievous. So we know that whatever their sin is, whether it's pride or homosexuality or rape or whatever it is, in the sight of God, it's a grievous sin. That's what he tells Abraham there in Genesis 18, 20. Now in Jude verse seven, there's only one chapter in Jude. You can jot this one down also if you want. But in Jude, Jude weighs in and says, Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to sexual immorality and perversion. So again, while homosexuality was not the only sin, it was also, according to Jude, part of the problem was their promiscuity sexually and their homosexuality. It was one of the many reasons. In fact, I think Ezekiel's probably where y'all got the singular thing. It was pride. But even there, it's not just pride. It's one of the long lists that Ezekiel gives. In fact, let me show you that one. Ezekiel 16, verses 49 through 50 explains this. Behold, this was the guilt of your sister Sodom. She and her daughters had pride, excess of food, and prosperous ease. but did not aid the poor and needy. They were haughty and did an abomination before me, so I removed them when I saw it. Of course, pride is seen here, of course, and that's what everybody camps on. Oh man, the sin of Sodom and Gomorrah was pride, and it was. But also, what's this thing about excess of food? Were they gluttonous? Probably. But more than even gluttony, if you read the context of this, the idea is that they had so much food and they were living large, prosperous ease, as the ESV puts it here. They were living wealthily, comfortably, with lots of food, but they could care less about aiding the poor and the needy. Isn't it interesting? So it's not just pride, it's not caring for the poor and needy. And then the next word is hati, which is linked to pride. If you kind of sum it up, this is the situation according to the prophet Ezekiel. And this is where people say, oh, the sin was pride, which it was. But isn't it interesting? It also included not caring about the poor and needy. Isn't it something? In the most gay pride cities in America, there's also the most homeless people in those same cities. The most people that are in poverty and living on drugs and fentanyl deaths. Like if you do the comparison, wherever homosexuality is embraced to the fullest extent, that's also the most homeless, dirty, messed up towns. Portland is often talked about as the top of that list. That's why I do wonder, if the Lord said, that's it Sodom, when does the Lord say that's it, not just for Portland, but the whole nation, the United States, and really the whole world as the world has taken on the Sodom and Gomorrah sort of attitude, the whole LGBTQ pride. Gay pride is a very national and international movement. Isn't it something that there's Christians out there that are saying, we can be gay and still be Christian churches. There's pastors that are gay and pastors now that are transgendered. But, you know, and they make these, for the last 20 years, they've been trying to make these esoteric arguments about how the Bible doesn't really teach against, you know, homosexuality. They try to make that argument. even though the Bible says in six very clear locations that homosexuality is called sin. Six times in the Bible. And a couple of those mentions are extremely clear. But they'll make the argument, oh, you know, this is one you'll hear by the way, that homosexuality, well, it's only gay rape that's really wrong. So when the Bible talks about homosexuality, what it's actually saying is, if there's not consent, then that's when it becomes sin. And that's one of their arguments, even though the Bible doesn't say that in the, any of the translations, or I'm sure there's an LGBTQ translation out there somewhere that they've changed the wording or whatever. It's not really a translation at all. But as far as scholarly translations of the original Greek and Hebrew texts of the Bible, it's very clear. You don't have to, people say, well, you gotta know the context. No, you don't. It's very clear. All you gotta do is read Romans chapter one, and it's as clear as a bell what God is saying about homosexuality. It's just a modern, only last few decades where people have tried to make the argument, oh, the Bible doesn't really teach against homosexuality. It's been saying the same thing for a couple thousand years. And for people to say that, oh, the Bible doesn't say that, it's haughty and prideful and arrogant to speak against the word that way. So the sins of Sodom included pride, but also you might say apathy, complacency. idleness, unconcerned about the underprivileged. You know, it's funny because we see that world, that group, who embraces, you know, the gay pride and all the other things that are associated with LGBTQ T-I-A plus whatever, I don't know. You can't keep up with the acronym, but the people that are associated with that, they're the same ones who claim to care about poor people, but the more they try to meddle in that, it only gets worse and worse and worse. It's really something. As it turns out, the Lord, He actually cares about people that are in poverty. You might say, well, Brad, it's just, we have different opinions on how you solve poverty and hunger and homelessness and all that. Well, we sure do. But giving needles and enabling people just to go and do horrible things to themselves, well, that's not the solution. And we have really messed that up. And you kind of have to be, I know this is a no-brainer, you kind of have to say, are we better off than we were 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 40 years ago? You go and travel around the country, you kind of forget if you live here in Portland, or if you don't live here in Portland, you don't know what we're up against here. But whenever I travel to another state, I'm always reminded of what Oregon used to be like 40 years ago. You know, if you go down to Texas or Arizona or even Florida, it's like, you know, there's no graffiti and there's cleaner streets and there's not people, you know, dying in their tents, you know, and stuff. It's just a whole different world. But we have sort of fostered this whole thing. And I think it's demonic. I think the whole thing is demonic. And that's where it comes from. The Bible actually talks about that. But with all that said, all these Christian people who are claiming to be Christians who have embraced LGBTQ, isn't it interesting that they're still stuck with this whole pride thing? That's what it's all about, gay pride, gay pride. And as a Christian, shouldn't we be uncomfortable with the word pride? Even if I give you the argument about homosexuality, shouldn't you kind of say, yeah, we probably shouldn't be into the pride thing because pride is one of the great sins of the Bible. In fact, pride is the very sin that caused Satan to be thrown out of heaven for crying out loud. Why would we ever as Christians or churches be associated with something in the Bible clearly called sin. I'm just making that point because this gay pride thing, even if you try to make a dumb argument about the Bible not teaching us homosexuality, which is impossible to do, but people try, at least you have to admit, should you call it gay pride? And should they have stole the rainbow of the book of Genesis to make that be their symbol? If you're a Christian and you claim to be pro-LGBTQ, can I just give you an honest question? What happened to your problem with pride and what happened with what God originally meant the rainbow to be? Because it has nothing to do with homosexuality. And so it's sobering when you think about this, because now when people say, oh, that everybody died, well, that's what happened in the flood. And by the way, we all deserve death. We all have sinned, we all fall short of the glory of God. This is something that we humbly have to all admit. But when you are sinning and you're saying, we're doing it pridefully, I think that even if you claim to be a Bible thinking Christian, it lacks integrity to the most base and root issue, if you are calling it gay pride. Right there alone, it's a horrible, horrible argument to make. And what does the Bible say? Oh, we could go on and on about this one. James 4, 6 is probably as clear as you can get it in the Bible. The Bible says, God resisteth the proud, but gives grace to the humble. You know, the pride movement, and we've watched this, if you're my age, you know, by the time I was in high school, the gay pride started really ramping up, and the whole view on homosexuality started to change, pretty crazy level change. But the pride movement tends to commend itself for having the truth, but they are actually just believing a horrible lie. And that lie is not helping people. See, this is where we have to be really careful about truth versus the lie that's being put out there. You know, it's interesting because I've noticed that the people that argue, that claim to be Christian, churches, you know, like the Episcopal Church and some of these others that claim to be Christians, but are not, they claim to be Christians because they embrace something that's rampantly sinful in the Bible. But it's how they view things. They kind of are comparing themselves, not with the Word of God, but they have this tendency to compare themselves one with another. Well, we're better than you and we're smart and we've got this and they compare. In fact, 2 Corinthians, Paul, he dives into this, 2 Corinthians 10, 12, where he says, not that we dare to classify or compare ourselves with some of those who are commending themselves, gay pride, but when they measure themselves by one another and compare themselves with one another, they are without understanding. One of the translations, that's the ESV, I brought that one out because I liked how easy it was to understand, but one of them says they've become fools, they've become fools. And it's always a bad thing when we try to compare ourselves one with another. In the gay pride argument, they often try to compare, well, what's the difference between you and a homosexual? Are you a sinner? And I always say, yeah, we're all sinners. One of the biggest differences, by the way, is most Christians that know their Bible, they know that all sin is bad. If the Bible calls it sin, it's bad. And we're gonna try not to do those things. Doesn't mean we're perfect, but we're not marching in pride saying we love doing our sinful things. Anybody that does that, they are in a bad situation because you're boasting of your sinfulness, not repenting. Without repentance, you're in big trouble. The Bible talks about those who continually practice such things will not inherit the kingdom of heaven. It's a scary enough verse for me to say, I'm not gonna go around marching about all my sins and saying, I'm into that and I'm gonna keep reinforcing my sins. Homosexuality is one of those sins that the world is marching and saying, we can do this as much as we want. And they've moved from being prideful to being horribly arrogant and now even somewhat militant is what we're seeing. It's really kind of an interesting thing to watch in the last couple of years, how fast things have changed. In John chapter three, verse 19 through 21, it says this, and this is the condemnation that light is coming to the world. And men love darkness rather than light because their deeds were evil. One of the things that people really don't like is when you turn on the light switch and say, this is darkness, and you expose that darkness for what it is. People love the darkness because their deeds are evil. They wanna stay in darkness. They don't wanna hear the truth because the truth is light. But it goes on and says, for everyone that doeth evil, hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved. But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God. The person who's knowing what their sinful deeds are, but not wanting to have it brought to light, they're trying to cover it up, they're gonna really hate the light. And so there's this war really that we're seeing. It's not just a war in our society or culture war or whatever, it's a war of light and dark, good and evil. And that's what we're seeing right now. And it's coming to a level in our culture in the United States to a real, I think a pivotal moment. It feels to me like we're reaching this level that seems very end times-ish, very last days. I'm not even sure, you know, when I was talking about this 25 years ago, I would imagine it gotten to this level so quickly. But Jesus, he talked about some things in the Olivet Discourse that even have to do with this. For example, when the world says love is love, What does that mean? Well, the world has their own definition of love and the Bible has its definition of love. And we have to be really careful about this. In fact, Jesus said in the Olivet Discourse, let me show you that, Matthew 24, verse 12. You know, Matthew 24, we've gone over that recently. It's the Olivet Discourse, the disciples asked Jesus, what are the signs of the end of the world? And Jesus gave the very long dissertation. We call it all of that discord, because he gave it on the Mount of Olives. But one of the little phrases in his sermon there, it says, and because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold. The love of many will wax cold. Is love lacking? on all fronts today, is love lacking between people? Is hatred stirred? Is strife even among Christians? Like even in the church, love has grown cold and waxed cold. But how sad that the church of Jesus Christ has really abandoned the true spirit of Christian love. There's something about love that I'm gonna talk about a little bit later, that I think we have redefined love only to our own detriment. And love is not just love, as somebody would like to say. It always cracks me up. That was the mantra. I think it was, was it Carrie Underwood who said that? Love is love. She was one of the first people who really publicly said that. And everybody said, I thought she was supposed to be a Christian, but it sounds so good. Love is love. People should just be able to love. But it's so ridiculous. All you have to do is ask this question. Well, I shouldn't say it like this, because it's becoming like this. I used to say, well, what do you say when a 45-year-old man loves a 12-year-old boy? And people used to gasp when I said that, because, oh, you know, pedophilia, that's not love. And it sort of begged the question, so is love love? Because if that 45-year-old man loves the 12-year-old boy, is that love? And most people back then would say, no, that's creepy, and that guy should go to jail. Today, today, it's one of the colors on the LGBTQIA flag. The little light blue stripe is for, what do they call it? Minor attracted persons to boys. And the pink stripe is for minor attracted persons for girls. It's celebrated pridefully now. So I can't use that example. So I'll go to the next level. Are you guys ready for this? What if you like your pet Fido at home and you love your dog and you wanna marry your dog? Breath, that's gross, bestiality. Oh, mark my words, that's the next step. I hate to say that because I was right 25 years ago when I talked about how pedophilia would become normalized and people left the church because they were, oh, Brett, that's horrible. I can't believe you would say such a thing. We'll never get to that place. There were people that really got upset when I was saying that 25 years ago. And I wasn't saying that just predicting prophetically, Pastor Brett giving a Bible prophecy. I wasn't doing that, I'm not a prophet. What I was doing was reading the psychological association journals that was sending up test balloons about minor attracted persons, but they didn't call it that back in those days. I remember when this phrase came out in one of the psychological journals back in, like it was around 1996. When it said, it made this statements, an older man having sex with a younger boy is not detrimental to that boy's sexual future or it's not detrimental to his psychology. That was the statement. People freaked out when they wrote that in the American Psychological Association Journal. I brought it up and then after I brought it up, then a few months later, they took it out of the journal because it was so controversial. But what I said about that back then was, these are little test balloons that they're sending up. That's what I said 25 years ago. Little test balloons to see if the culture will sustain this idea. And then they've just chipped away at it very patiently. It's one thing the LGBTQ community has done, it's been very patient. but now that patience has turned into militance, and we're gonna see more of that as we get into it. So we'll talk about what real love is here in a second, but here's the scarier part, if you're seeing what's going on. It's actually 2 Thessalonians chapter two, verse 11 and 12. It says, therefore God, now this is talking about during the tribulation period. I'm just gonna jump ahead in time. This is gonna happen during the tribulation period. Therefore God will send them a strong delusion so that they may believe what is false in order that they all may be condemned who did not believe the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness. This is where, it's gonna end up, the whole enchilada is gonna end up right here during the tribulation period. This is what it's gonna look like. You say, well, Brent, we're already there. One of the things I wanna encourage you as Christians, is we're not there yet. How do we know we're not there yet? Because we're not in the tribulation period, but this is what the tribulation is gonna look like, this verse right here. Therefore God will send them strong delusion. In other words, they chose to have pleasure in unrighteousness, bottom of that verse 12, and they did not believe the truth when they had a chance to. So God ultimately is gonna say, I'm gonna send you strong delusion. Are they gonna be able to be fixed and corrected after God sends them strong delusion? No, that's a sealed deal. If God sends strong delusion, you'll be real confused after that, because God's good at doing those kinds of things. By the way, do you remember where he confused people in previous years of ancient times? Tower of Babel. I almost wonder if it's a little bit like that at the Tower of Babel, when humanity came together, thinking we were so smart, and God confused their tongues, and they all scattered, totally not knowing what each other was saying. In the same way, during the tribulation, those that have embraced rampant sinful unrighteousness, the Lord's gonna send them to strong delusion. Does it remind you of Romans 1, where God gives them over to their own lust? I mean, this is a theme in the Bible, by the way. But the reason I wanted to show you this is that the strong delusion, you might say, Brett, that's already here, it's here, but we don't know that for sure. Has God sent strong delusion or just people just really confused? I'm not sure, but the point is we will not know for sure until the tribulation period. Well, Brett, you teach the pre-trib rapture, we're not gonna be here. Yeah, it'll be too late by that time, we'll be out of here. Because we are, 2 Thessalonians 2, what is the church doing right now before all this happens, anybody? We're letting, we're holding stuff back. Does it feel like we're doing very good at holding stuff back right now? Apparently we are. I wish I could tell you. I mean, we've had some neat stories. We have people at 8th and Creek that have come out of the LGBTQ lifestyle. And it's neat to see how the Lord blesses them. There's this one guy who has just, every time he comes to church, he just weeps because he feels like he never knew people that loved him. You wanna know who was the most horrible to him? Was the people that formerly were his people in the LGBTQ. But once he accepts Jesus, they hated him. In the same way, we have an opportunity still, you and I. I think my point of this is, this is gonna happen during the tribulation, but it hasn't happened yet. So there's still hope to bring people to the truth. Until God sends strong delusion, you might say, Brad, there's no way I'm gonna be able to convince somebody to change. The world is so strong on this LGBTQ thing, and if you even talk about it, you're considered a bigot, homophobe, transphobe, all the horrible names, along with a bunch of expletives that are horrible. That's who you are, they hate you. But that strong delusion has not been sent until Antichrist is revealed, if you read the rest of 2 Thessalonians 2, and the tribulation period kicks into gear. So until that happens. You and I should not give up. It says, their strong delusion will come, and it says, in order that all will be condemned. That's the point of it. God's gonna say, time's up. You, people of tribulation period, there's gonna be a group of people so stuck in their unrighteousness, the Lord's gonna make it so that they will be ultimately condemned in their sin. Well, that's not very nice of God, somebody might protest. God has been patient for millennia. His Word has been as clear as you could get it. There's nothing clearer than God's Word. And God has been patient. Oh, it's true, the old statement, the wheels of God's judgment turn slowly, but they grind thoroughly. That grinding is gonna happen during the tribulation period. It's called the time of the wrath of the Lamb. That's coming in the future. Until that comes, you and I should not lose hope to try to show people the truth, speak the truth, live the truth. This is what we wanna kind of talk about. And you might say, well, you know, if this is coming, is this hopeless? Well, we can't say that. Those who are being deceived in the tribulation are being deceived by the man of sin, the Bible says, the antichrist who's coming. But they're all perishing as a result of refusing to love the truth. refusing to love the truth. And instead they're gonna exchange the truth for a lie. And that's what the world is doing. They're exchanging the truth of God for a lie. And that's what we're seeing. And so you say, well, Brett, this is a hostile time to bring this up. I mean, I'd rather just be quiet. And man, you know, I don't care what they do. How many of you have heard this long enough to say, you know, this is the mantra. I mean, how many people have I known over the years, Christians who said, well, as long as they can do whatever they want in the privacy of their own home, but you know, don't make me, you know, and that was what people said. Do you guys hear people say that? How'd that work out for us as a church? Those of us who just quietly sat by and just said, I'm not gonna say anything. They can, if they wanna, you know, I remember that was the way it is with the drug thing. I had college professors at Southern Oregon University, that bastion of intellect, the place of ridiculous, it's basically a miniature berserkly down there at Southern Oregon University, Ashland, Oregon, if you can imagine. But I had one, believe it or not, I had a computer programming class and all the prof ever did was talk about legalizing drugs. That's all he ever talked about. I don't even remember learning one thing about computers in his class. I think he was smoking weed before class, and then he was all about legalizing drugs. But, you know, he gave all his arguments, and I have to admit, he gave pretty good arguments. I mean, I was Mr. Anti-drug, but even listening to him, I think, well, you know, makes a good point there and makes a good point there. But one of his points was, and man, if people aren't responsible, it's Darwinianism, the survival of the fittest. If they do their drugs, they'll all die and they'll be killed off and we'll be able to move on without them and things will be better. That was one of his arguments. I wish I could talk to him now. He's probably dead, probably OD'd somewhere. But he was a weird, weird prof, I gotta say. But this sort of saying, we're just gonna be silent as long as, I'm not gonna worry about what those people are doing. And that's one of the arguments of LGBTQ, just mind your own business. What's it to you, how we do this or how we, well, I wanna show you a little bit how that's working out. Because if you give an inch, they're gonna take a mile. That's what Satan does. And I think the church has just sort of waffled and a lot of the church say, well, we're not even gonna talk about that issue. And by sticking our heads in the sand, and I'm gonna say, Hays the Greek hasn't done that, I'll tell you why. It's not because we're bold and brave and more courageous than anybody else. It's just when you teach verse by verse through the Bible, you can't avoid these topics. They come up and you have to talk about them or sort of explain them away, which I can't do. So we've talked about these issues as they've come up through the Bible, which I'm so thankful, by the way, for the anchor of the word. It keeps us honest. It keeps us on track. But the church doesn't say, well, we're just not gonna deal with that. That has not helped the church. The same people that were trying to be mamby-pamby talking about balancing your checkbook and focusing on family and 10 steps to better communication in your marriage. I mean, those are all great topics, but if you're not gonna talk about the issues that people are really facing in the world, don't be surprised when it comes to get you later on. It's so funny to me how they were short-sighted. You know, here's a funny thing. I've got people that I've known for years. There's people that started at Athe Creek, got saved, and later became LGBTQ. I've got people that I would actually call friends, and they'll send me messages once in a while saying, oh, Brett, did you see this? And they're making their LGBTQ arguments. It's almost like they still wish they could be part of Athe Creek, but they know that they disagree. I would love to have them be here at church and learning from the scripture and repent of their sin, but they don't want that. But there's a group of those people that I talk to once in a while. And you know what I'm finding? Even they're a little shocked at how much territory is being taken. A lot of those people that went to the LGB, well, we'll just call it LG. Back when it was just, remember it was just LG, lesbians and gays. Some of those people who are, what I would say now, we as heterosexuals look at these people almost as what you would call normal. Now they're saying, what? You mean men can menstruate? and men can have babies and women are being crushed and swimming and by men, like there's people at the LG community that are saying, wow, this has gone too far. There's actually whole or big organizations, gays and lesbians against transgenderism and all the other wokeness and weirdness. And even they're saying, yeah, this is getting a little crazy. So what do you do with that? Meanwhile, the church said, oh, we're just not gonna let it bother us. And now, whether you like it or not, it's gonna be in your face. It's gonna be in your grill. And it's gonna get even more radical, I think, in that very short amount of time. Did you see this Breitbart article? This is kind of a sort of a brutal threat, really. LGBTQ activists warn corporate America, you need to be our ally. And one of the things that you have perhaps seen I'm not gonna go into all the BlackRock stuff and all these big giant money sources, but do you sense that there's something huge that's influencing stuff, that's making people look really stupid? So like when Bud Light says, hey, let's put this guy on our, and then the executives say, oh, we didn't know they were gonna do that. Is that really good CEO type stuff? Like, would you still have your job after losing, you know, $10 billion? Or what about the Dodgers? You know, the Dodgers and the sisters of what? Sisters of perversion, indulging, yeah. They're basically the nuns, they dress up these gay or transgender guys dress up like nuns and they stripper dance on the cross with Jesus hanging from the cross. And the Dodgers said, hey, let's make that part of our theme for our ballpark. And now where did they come with that idea? And who thought that would be a good idea for the baseball crowd? Well, there was a backlash. If you know this whole story, there was a backlash and people said, are you kidding me? That's an insult to anyone who believes in Jesus Christ. And so what did the Dodgers do? They pulled their honoring of the Sisters of Indulgences or whatever, which you think, oh, well, I guess that's good, but it's bad that they did it to begin with, but at least they withdrew it. But then a few days later, there was backlash from the LGBT community and said, you better put them back on. And so the Dodgers put them back in. Like, Where's the leadership in the Dodgers organization? Like, I'm embarrassed for them. Somebody's behind the curtain, like the Wizard of Oz, pulling the strings. And if you don't understand, there's huge amounts of money involved with this stuff. And the powers that are way back several layers away from you and me, like BlackRock and those big money people, there's a bunch of people with huge agendas that are pushing these companies, Target, Bud Light, the Dodgers, Listerine for crying out loud, Target, like all these, I mean, we can just go on. Why would a company go woke and go broke? It's math today. It's just good math. You'll know if you do something crazy enough, it's gonna cost you. So why would they do it? And especially like, you know, things that have nothing to do with LGBTQ. Like, you know, if you're buying a Ford truck, is that a good idea to paint a Raptor? I gotta sell my truck now. Well, I'm not gonna sell my Raptor, so. You know, you're like, come on, bro, are you kidding? F-150, there was a gate, the Ford made a striped F-150. I'm like, oh, I gotta go in the Dodge. No, I won't even do that for that, but. Pretty soon, you gotta boycott everything if you're not careful. You won't be able to, you'll be hitchhiking to church if you're not careful. But this article says, LGBT activists called for new campaigns Monday to warn corporate leaders not to heed opposing voices while chastening those who relent in the face of public pressure. So with the Dodgers, a bunch of the, I talked about one of the guys last week, but the Dodgers, a bunch of the players in the major league baseball, you know, different teams and stuff, they're all saying, yeah, we don't want anything to do with this. What are you guys doing? but there's some power that's behind there saying, no, you're gonna do this, and it's become a threat. Some of the players have even come back, said, oh, I'm sorry, like the one I mentioned last week, who said, I'm sorry, I have gay friends, and I didn't realize, and he didn't realize, he posted a video about how the Bible says we're not supposed to support this kind of sin. He was right the first time, but I'm sure somebody came and said, do you wanna play baseball any longer in your life? If you do, you're gonna go and publicly say you're sorry. There's huge pressure. So no longer is it just people sticking their heads in the sand saying, yeah, we just don't. Now, if you go to high school at Tualatin on their silent day of homosexuality, and you speak during that day, you're a homophobe, transphobe, bigoted, blankety, blankety, blank. That's what they do. You can't say a word. That's what it was when my kids were going to Tualatin. Now, if you're not wearing the shirt, and if you're not marching with the flag and all that stuff, you are not an ally, you are an enemy. And it's turning into this quite horrible shaming. I talked about this on Wednesday night, the struggle sessions in China. How many guys have heard of that before, the struggle sessions? It's something we need to kind of bring back, and I'll tell you why, to the forefront of history and understanding it. And I'll tell you, this was back in the 1966 is when this was happening, it wasn't that long ago. But Maoist China basically says that we're gonna reset our people. And the way you reset people is you totally change all their morality and you just make them believe. And if there's old school people saying, we're not gonna believe that nonsense, you shame them. And you get the young people to come and shame their parents and shame the older people. And the reason I bring this up again, the struggle sessions, you can look it up if you want to. Struggle sessions was basically, or they also called them denunciation rallies. But basically Maoist China where people were accused of being class enemies. This is what you are being called if you're not a LGBTQ supporter, you're not an ally. And it's the same thing, class enemies is what they were back. And if you were an old farmer, like this little guy on the left here, he was a landlord of a farm region, but he wouldn't give into the Maoist crazy things that they were saying that were totally false. And he said, I just, I can't not believe something that's not true. So they would put them and shame them, put signs around their necks, shaming them, make them wear dunce caps. And sometimes they were tortured even, publicly humiliated. The process of the struggle sessions demonstrated to the masses that the party was determined to subdue its opposition. And they would label them class enemies. The potential rivals were crushed. Those who attacked the targeted foes became complicit in the violence, and then they were considered strong, invested in the state. They would be, if you made your grandfather go through shaming, you would be raised to a very high level in society. They did that. You can look this up, but basically these served to consolidate the party's control, which they thought was necessary. Now, they made this illegal, I think somewhere in the late 70s. It got so crazy, they made it illegal. But by that time, communist China had already kind of got its footing, and it is what it is today. What you see in China was really, today, was very much started right here. And you still see whispers of this in China, of course, during the COVID thing and what have you. But, you know, here's the problem. I think a lot of the Christians who've stuck their heads in the sand, they still don't believe that it's as bad as it really is. Like when I talk to Christians, oh, Brad, you know, why are you so, why is homosexuality your pet sin that you wanna talk about at Athey Creek? And it's really something. I was asked that 20 years ago once by a guy. And I said, well, it's not my pet sin. I just go through the Bible and talk about it when it comes up. And then when we talk about Bible prophecy, this is one of the signs of the end. But now nobody's laughing. It's the forefront of our culture and people are more crazy than we even imagine. Did you see this target worker? Let me show you this little snippet. Maybe you saw this. Do you support the satanic pride propaganda? I, yeah, both. You support it? Satan and pride. You support Satan? Mm-hmm. What's God gonna think of that? I don't believe in God. Wow. Did you need help with something? You support the propaganda that's targeting the kids? There's nothing targeting kids. It's all over kids TV shows. It's all over. They're targeting kids. Kids can choose to wear whatever they want. Do you support the sexualization of kids through pride propaganda by corporate? Is there something that we can help you with? I'm just asking people questions. What about you, sir? Do you support this? That's the undercover security guard that was called, because this guy was asking the questions in Target. But this lady, yeah, I worship Satan. I don't believe in God. And yes, I don't have a problem with children, that children can wear whatever they want. This is, you think, oh, she's just a crazy person way out there. No, this is becoming mainstream. If you're a Christian who doesn't watch the news or see what's going on in the world, this is, especially Portland, this is where we live. These are the people that live around us. And now, one of the things before I get further to this, we're gonna talk about how we, how do we think about that person? What should be our heart about that person? Even the guy, I'm not sure I know about this guy who is interviewing her and he seemed like he was a little pushy or whatever, but I did hear something that I kinda, did you hear when she said, I don't believe in God and you kinda heard him go, huh? Like, I was like, that was my heart. I thought, oh, this woman is lost. and she needs to be saved by God's grace. We need to have compassion, not just, I understand there's a defensiveness and we need to protect our children, I get that. but there also has to be a compassion that we need to be thinking about here. We'll talk more about that in a second. Did you see, you know, the Target, all the LGBTQ stuff in Target, one of the artists that they employed to make the shirts and all the stuff that Target, it kind of came out that, you know, he was a Satanist as it was, but he doesn't now claim to be a Satanist, but his stuff is constantly very much like Satanist type stuff. Now, the stuff that he made for Target wasn't the worst of it, but this Washington Post article, Trans Designer Dumped by Target. explains how he got smeared as Satanist. So this transgender artist, you can see some of the clothing there, you know, cure transphobia, not trans people. This is his artwork that he does. Activists soon discovered Carnell's independent web store, where he has sold, among other items, pins and medallions that use satanic and occult imagery to make points about transphobia. So they assumed he was a Satanist. He says, I'm not a Satanist, but, you know, like for example, I'll show you this in a second, a lavender goat headed medallion that reads Satan respects pronouns is among his most popular designs. So you can't blame people for thinking he's a Satanist. And among his most popular designs is a pin depicting a guillotine with a label homophobe headrest. In fact, let me show you some of his art that's on his Etsy. This is his artwork. There's the guillotine in the middle with the little loving guillotine that says homophobe headrest on there, which means you think that homophobic people should be beheaded. Does that sound familiar? Who gets beheaded in the last days, by the way? You know, it's funny how we laugh at this and think, but it's gonna happen. The tribulation saints will be beheaded, the Bible says, for what they believe in the tribulation. Fortunately, we're not gonna be here, we'll be raptured up out of here. But this heteronormativity is a plague, Satan respects pronouns. These are the kinds of artworks that this guy does. But I'm just saying, Once we thought, oh, it's not gonna bother me. What should I care about what they believe? This is the mindset. It's not just let us do what we wanna do, but we're gonna cram it down your throat. And unless you stand there and say, Heil Hitler, or respect your pronouns, we're coming after you. That's what's actually happening. It's interesting because the narrative bounces back and forth. Did you see, it's always interesting to me, the view is such a great source. But did you hear whoopee cushion on this one? I'm sorry, I'm sorry. This shocked me, but I saw this snippet, I wanted to share it with you. What is the fear? Why are people afraid of a shirt? Of a rainbow flag. I am sick of people moving my desires because their desires are not being met in some way. I am sick of people telling me I can't go to a drag show. Now, my question is, who is banning whoopee from going to a drag show? There's no one on the planet that I know of that's saying, whoopee cushion, you cannot go to a drag show. You can go there. And by the way, that's been the Christian thing. Hey, if they wanna do that stuff, that's the way the church has sort of handled like, yeah, whatever. But look where this is getting us. It's kind of saying nothing, doing nothing, being nothing, just saying, well, if the world wants to do this, then we're just gonna stand by. So, you know, nobody, the problem comes when you try to take the innocence of children. That's the problem with Target. She's missing the point completely. What governors are banning in certain states is children being exposed to half naked men who are sexualizing children in these drag queen shows and what have you. It's not Whoopi going to the drag queen show that is a problem as much as we see, they're all over the place. They're doing family drag queen shows where, I mean, I can't even, I was thinking about showing some of the evidence of this, but it's just too graphic, too gross, seeing these children sitting in lap dance chairs with these men doing these horrible things. We used to call it pedophilia. But as Target goes, they're promoting gender ideologies to babies. Here's, you can go, I went to, I got these two pictures from Target's website right here. I haven't been in Target for probably 10 years or any other store for that matter. But these are, these are on this, I got this, these are screenshots from being proud for a baby, a little onesie for a baby, being proud. And then this book is on sale, Bye Bye Binary. Basically, nobody puts baby in a pink or blue corner and you can see the defiance in the little baby's eyes. They said, who's afraid of a rainbow flag or whatever? No one's afraid of a rainbow. But what we don't like is people sexualizing kids. These are sexualized topics that are being forced on young children. We don't like people forcing their ideologies on our kids by forcing their rainbow religion on everything. Everywhere we turn, we see them cramming it down their throats. It's in the government's school curriculum. And if parents, if you don't understand this, and I'm telling you, if you send your kids to public school, you have no idea the indoctrination level that they're forcing this on children. And it's starting earlier and earlier. It used to be, oh, high school, they're talking about that, or maybe middle school, but it's at the youngest of ages. Your kids, there's little boys in our local elementary schools going into bathrooms with their tampon dispensers and wondering, what in the world is that there for? And it's all part of a numbing and an ideology that's being forced on our children. So all that to say, Ephesians by the way, Ephesians 5, 11, this is where it is hard because I've not been a big boycott person just because you'd have to boycott everything. There's evil in just about everything. But I do sort of sense a little difference in what's happening right now in that when you give your money to some of these organizations, you really are encouraging. More than ever, it's like you're encouraging this behavior. And you can, as much as I'm not a big boycott person, I have to say, you can speak with your money. I mean, Target losing $10 billion the last couple weeks, that does make a statement, that really does. The Dodgers are feeling it, and others. And also you kind of can't really get around this verse. Ephesians five, verse 11 through 14, take no part in the unfruitful works of darkness, but instead expose them. For it is shameful even to speak of the things that they do in secret. See, that's the truth. What's happening, like it's shameful to even talk about the LGBTQ agenda, no matter what one of those letters you're talking about, it's shameful to talk about it even, the Bible says. But when anything is exposed by the light, it becomes visible. For anything that becomes visible as light, therefore it says, wake, O sleeper, arise from the dead and Christ will shine on you. So the idea, you know, is to not be a part of it. You know, if you're a North Face fan, a lot of Oregonians, you know, North Face, you know, hiking and jackets and stuff, is it gonna be hard for you to buy your next North Face bag or jacket after seeing their commercial? This is their commercial for 2023, the month of June. Hi, it's me Patagonia, a real-life homosexual, and today I'm here with the North Face. We are here to invite you to come out in nature with us! Wow, this is nice! We like to call this little tour the Summer of Pride. This tour has everything. Hiking. Community. Art. Lesbians. Lesbians making art. Last year, we gaisaged across the nation and celebrated Pride across the nation with hundreds of you across the nation. This year, we're back, back, back again with two new stops. Atlanta, GA. Why? Because you're there. And Salt Lake City, we're coming for you. Of course, this year, all these fabulous speakers will be coming from inside this TV to a nature near you. So come outside and celebrate the beautiful LGHG TV community. That's pretty gay. So where are the women? If I were a woman, which I'm not, just in case you were wondering, I would be deeply offended that this character is trying to depict himself as a woman. And what's going on? Why would the North Face, and by the way, North Face is paying a dear price, just like Bud Light, just like Target, for making this commercial now. It's costing them a lot, as it probably should, I gotta say. But this is just rampant anti-woman, pro-gay and lesbian. Brett, they're just trying to be funny. No, you're missing the point. If you think that's just them trying to be funny, this is them being dead serious. I hope you understand that. If you think it's just trying to be funny, you don't understand what's actually going on. This is people flying in the face of God. I hope you understand that. Romans 1, I mentioned it earlier, let's just take a quick look at it. Therefore God, just like he's gonna do in the tribulation, 1 Thessalonians 2, therefore God gave them up in the lust of their heart to impurity, to the dishonoring of their bodies among themselves, because they exchanged the truth about God for a lie and worshiped and served the creature rather than the creator, who is blessed forever, amen. For this reason, God gave them up to dishonorable passions. Or as the King James reprobate mine, it goes on, for their women exchanged natural relations for those that are contrary to nature. And the men likewise gave up natural relations with women and were consumed with passion one for another, men committing shameless acts with men and receiving in themselves the due penalty for their error. And since they did not see fit to acknowledge God, God gave them up to a debased mind to do what ought not to be done. Oh, Brett, you took that out of context. I just read a huge chunk of scripture. Did anybody stumble on that one? Like that's pretty clear out there. But what's so interesting is agencies and groups that don't really need to weigh in on this are weighing in. That another most trustworthy, one of the most trusted institutions in America, the FBI. Did you see, they had their, this was their website 2019. I don't know what it's gonna be this year, but Pride Month, FBI is celebrating along with everybody else. You know, we have corruption within law enforcement, the legal system, America's major cities are eliminating bail, putting criminals back on the streets, theft going unpunished, inconsistent legal standards, depending on what political viewpoints you hold, pandemic lockdowns, Antifa, Black Lives Matter activists permitted to do massive protests, burn down buildings, you know, kill people, but they all got away with it. Billions of dollars of damage and destruction, but be of good cheer, the FBI knows how to be virtue signaling when it comes to LGBTQI+. Like, do I need to bring up the Durham report on the FBI this last month? I mean, I probably shouldn't go into all this because it gets off on another tangent, but you know, the FBI, this is the hill, this article was actually trying to, If you read it, it was trying to defend the FBI, but it didn't really come out that way. They said in this article, if you believe there was or is a deep state of bureaucrats, Washington insiders, and power brokers who operate outside the law and do pretty much whatever they want, in this case, you are right. Chalk one up for the conspiracy theorists. That's what this article said because of the Durham report. The Durham report, you know, if you're not aware, it was basically that study, well, you know, was there collusion, Russian collusion? And man, I don't even wanna go into all that, but the whole idea of that lie during Trump's whole presidency, he was up against this accusation that the Durham report comes out, even CNN said, wow, I guess Trump was exonerated. That's like CNN said that. If you can believe that, even MSNBC said, yeah, well, Trump, I guess he was right about that. They just kind of quickly said that, let's move on, nothing to see here. So I'm just, I know I'm getting political here, but if you don't believe that the election was stolen, let's just say, you don't believe that. Could you make the argument because of this lie that had been perpetuated by the other side, the opponents of Donald Trump in 2016, this lie, and it plagued his whole presidency the whole time he was a president, would you say that that was messing with the election when he was running in 2020? You know, some would say that's interference, they would call it interference on that. And yet, you know, even when CNN's admitting it, nobody's really admitting it, if you know what I mean. It's all part of the corruption. See, what we're seeing in this day is a massive dose of corruption in the FBI, corruption in government, and it's all part of this huge thing, and it's all kind of linked to these powerful agencies that are pushing the LGBTQIA agenda. By the way, one of the things I tend to call out is psychology. Have you heard me call out, where is psychology on the transgender issue? They've been deathly silent and I've been crying out, where are the psychologists? And nobody's saying anything. Until recently, there was finally, listen to this. This was an interesting WorldNet Daily article. Transgender surgery offers no mental health boost, study confirms. Like, we didn't know that, but transgender surgery, the article says, also known as gender-affirming surgery, does not reduce the demand for mental health services, according to a study conducted by the American Journal of Psychiatry, the AJP. The study following AJP's redaction concluded that transgender surgery offers no improvement of one's mental health and even suggested that there was an increase in treatment for anxiety after surgery. You think? Like we didn't even have to do a study. We were crying out. See, the people who really love people and love the poor transgender community, people that really love them, we've been crying out this for a long time. Do you wanna help a transgender person? Don't give them surgery. Don't give them puberty blockers, especially if they're children. It's ridiculous. And they wonder why anxiety is only ramping up after surgery. So then you kind of say, okay, Brett, yeah, we need to get angry. We need to start screaming. Well, maybe some of you, but I think that there's something we need to talk about, about how, what do we do about all this as Christian people in this day where it's moved from just, not just LGBTQ, just tolerance. Remember it was tolerance. Now it's cramming down our throats. Now they're making our, they're not telling parents of children that are getting puberty blockers in the schools. They're cramming it down our children's throat. It's bleeding into our families and our homes. So what do we do? Well, I've got, the first thing I'm gonna say is probably gonna set some of you guys off, but I need to have you listen and hear me out. What's our response? What should we do about this? Number one, one on the list is love. I knew you guys weren't gonna like that. You're like. Love, we gotta love, yes. What does the Bible say? What does Christianity look like? It's so important, but here's what I gotta say. What is love? Well, love is love. No, it's not. Love looks different than what the world is cramming down our throats as well. There's a redefining of love. And I wanna talk to you about this. In fact, what's probably the most famous chapter on love, anybody? You can say John, you know, 1 John, you can say that. But probably most of you, 1 Corinthians 13 is kind of the love chapter, right? What does it say? Check this out. 1 Corinthians 13 says, love rejoices not in iniquity. but rejoices in the truth. So is it loving to rejoice in homosexuality? Is it loving to live the lie and call someone a pronoun that's not even really true and call a he, a she when really biologically it's just not true? Love doesn't do that. See, the world says that's hate. You hate. No, the Bible says that's actually love. Speaking truth and not rejoicing in iniquity. Today, the church, and I'm gonna use this broad stroke, because not all the church has done this, but a lot of the church, I'm shocked, a lot of the church has adopted a weird, even worldly version of compassion. And it basically says this, you know, we wanna love you, but we don't wanna really tell you the truth. So we're gonna love you, come to our church, be as you are. One of the things you see is this old mantra, come as you are to our church. Question, is that okay to come as you are to our church? Yeah. I hope people come as they are at Athey Creek, but I hope they leave very different. In fact, all of us. I hope you, I hope me, I hope us, we. That's the point. You come to church to be transformed by the renewing of your mind, by seeking the Lord. The Lord changes us, transforms us. It's that metamorphosis that the Lord wants to do in all of our lives. The Lord didn't save you to keep you the way you are. It's the prideful, arrogant persons. I love the way I am and I don't need to change. Forget God's transformation in my life. That's what people say. So the church trying to be relatable, we've become squishy, gishy. I call it sloppy agape, where the church is saying, we're gonna love you, but we don't wanna tell you the truth. And you can just stay the way you are and all that. We're affirming people in a lifestyle that's killing them. Do you understand that? Transgenderism is killing people. It's the most, the highest suicide rate of any person group in the world, transgenderism. And they're hugging them right on their way off the cliff. That's not love. Love is glad when truth is spoken. Love aims at the truth. Love supports the truth. Check out Paul the Apostle put it when he was talking, did the Corinthian church have some problems? If you read about the Corinthians, they were Paul's like unfavorite church. He loved the Philippians, he loved the Colossians, but when it came to the Corinthians, he's like, he gives them a whooping, like big time. But listen to what Paul said, this is interesting, 2 Corinthians 2, 4, for I wrote to you out of much affliction and anguish of heart and with many tears, not to cause you pain, but to let you know the abundant love that I have for you. What's he saying? It's the same thing that my dad said when I didn't understand when I was five years old. He says, Brett, I've gotta spank you. This is gonna hurt me more than it's gonna hurt you. I'm like, no, it's not. I know that's not true. but as an adult now I realize, oh yeah, that was true. It is painful as a parent to have to speak the truth to your children and call them out and even discipline. Whom the Lord loves, he chastens. Paul's saying, I gave you, Christians, a strong, harsh word, and I did it with many tears, because I didn't want to purposefully cause you pain, but I still did it because I loved you. Sometimes those words are loving. So to speak the truth is loving. Why did I say 25 years ago that pedophilia is gonna be normalized? Was I trying to be a shock person and just make people freak out? No, it was actually out of love saying, church, we need to wake up and see where this is going. But it's sad, not only did the church at that time not wanna hear it, but good solid Christians, but the world, they were planning and plotting the whole time. There's people, I think, that owe some serious apologies now, but nobody's doing that. It was shocking to see CNN say, oh, Trump was exonerated on the whole Russian collusion, the no collusion, that whole thing. We did get a little bit of satisfaction from that, but do you remember this clip? This is a clip, Bill Maher and Dennis Prager, 2019. Check this out. This sums it up of what I'm saying right here. You say that men can menstruate is a lie, and that is now, that is what is said. Wait, wait, wait, where did that come from? I never said that. You never heard it, right? Okay, check it out. Anyone who says a man cannot menstruate is considered transphobic. I missed this whole story. You did? I did. Tell me where you're getting this. Just Google it, can men menstruate? Who is saying this? You're talking about a very small percentage. Oh really? Dennis, I remember you in the old show, you were a little more reasonable. What did I say that wasn't under you? You said that we think that men menstruate and no one does. Have you heard about it? I'm a doctor. I missed that one, I confess. And this is one of the premier reporters. He knows everything. These people are very... He's a doctor. He's one of the great investigators. I would make a friendly bet that the LGBTQ normative statement is men can menstruate. Now we all realize why, Prager was right about that one. And then some, more than probably he even knew how bad it was gonna be. People are, that is what they're saying today. Now, if you know Bill Maher, who wrote, or had the movie Religiousness, or what was it called, Religiousness? It was a bash against Christianity. Bill Maher was never a friend of conservatism or Christianity or anything, but he's starting to sound like a, a conservative guy, have you heard Bill Maher? Like he's a different dude now talking about some of this stuff. Kind of interesting. Some people are realizing they were on the wrong side of this argument. And even some of the gay and lesbian people are shocked and saying, we're on the wrong side of the argument. I do feel compelled to say, if you're a gay person or a lesbian person who's watching online here, can you kind of do the math and sort of extrapolate where we've been, that what you were told, the bill of goods you were sold, and where we were warning about this 20 years ago, where it was gonna go. Maybe you should think about this because what's happened is everything that we said was gonna happen is happening. The reason we know it is because the Bible says men are gonna do their own thing. They're gonna come up with their own sins and rebel against the Lord. But where that leads, the way of the transgressor is hard and it leads to death. And so the people are like men menstruating, that's ridiculous. Nobody with a half a brain would believe that. But now there's a huge part of our community that says, oh yeah, that's totally doable. And so it's important to speak the truth and really think, have I been duped? Have I been duped by culture? The reason I say that is how many people have been duped? They've been fooled by this world and they've been drinking the Kool-Aid. And it's time for Christians to come out of the dark into the light and see it all for what it is. It's important to see grace and truth working in tandem. In fact, you know, this is from John chapter one, verse 14, the word was made flesh and dwelt among us and we beheld his glory. The glory is only begotten of the father, full of grace and truth. This is the balance you and I need. Grace and truth. This is what Jesus, this is talking about Jesus, the word made flesh dwelling among us, that's Jesus. And I love that Jesus spoke the truth always, but he also was full of grace. That's the balance we need. We need to speak the truth in love. Grace and truth working in tandem. Not sloppy agape where we're just all about grace and just, oh, we love everyone and love wins and love, love, love, love, love. No, that's not true love. Jesus demonstrates perfect balance, full, as it says here, full of both grace and truth. That's what we, the church, need. In all other religions, by the way, Truth and grace are not balanced. If you actually do an interesting comparative study of religions, which some of you did maybe in college, you mark my words, you will not find a balance of grace and truth in any other religion. It's only Christ who actually offers that perfect balance. So love is not always affirming. Love is not always giving a pat on the back and blessing. Love can be very sharp and contrary because it's love. Any good parent knows this. There's times you have to say no to your children and they'll say, you don't love me. Like, no, I'm saying no because I do love you. Same thing with the church, same thing with the Bible, same thing with the world and truth. And love has to be both. The squishy, lovey-dovey, compassionate side, yes, but it also has to speak the truth. This is the mark of a Christian, you know, John 13, 35, by this, shall all men know that you are my disciples. if you have love for one another. So the first one on the list, what do we do in these times that we're seeing where LGBTQs on gay pride month, the month of June being crammed down our throats, love, but make sure that's the complete version of love, not just the squishy part of love, but the truth side as well. Grace and truth coupled together. But then the second thing we do in this June prideful month is live the truth. You know, you gotta live out the truth. You know, I think if you're not living the truth, nobody's gonna believe that you know the truth. If you're doing all kinds of sinful things and having sinful attitudes and actions, nobody cares what you think. And you won't have the authority to speak the truth if you're living the party lifestyle and doing sinful stuff. So many people wonder why nobody cares what they think. It's because we aren't living up to the truth that we believe. I love 1 Timothy, you know, where Paul said to Timothy in 4, 12, but be thou an example of the believers in word, in conversation, in charity, in spirit, in faith, in purity. Until I come, give attendance to reading, to exhortation, and to doctrine. Can I just say humbly, this is Athie Creek's goal. This is our goal as a church, but it should be our goal as Athie Creekers too, to be example of believers in conversation. That's not just word, that means your profession, how you live in love, charity, in spirit, faith, purity, but giving attendance to reading. That's where the word of God comes in, the power of God's word. Give attendance to the reading of scripture, to exhortation, and don't forget about doctrine. Doctrine matters. Churches have just said, we forget about doctrine. We're gonna go with the culture. We're gonna go with what the world is saying. We gotta change that. So what's our response? Number one, love. Number two, live the truth, be believers, but also look for the coming of our Lord. You might say, Brad, it's futile. It's done, man, the world's just gone crazy and there's nothing we can do about it. Well, you can't say that until you're raptured and taken up to be the Lord. You and I should always be busy about trying, sharing the gospel, loving people, both the good kind of love and also the tough kind of love. But love's gotta be a part of the deal. We should never give up. With your neighbors, with your schoolmates, with your family members, don't give up. Live the truth, but you might say, but brother, it's futile. Well, just remember at some point, time will be up. And we should be, that's what the Bible tells us. We should be looking for the appearing of our Lord, even Luke 21, 28. And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, lift up your heads where your redemption draws nigh. Well, those are the three things I think that are really important, to look for the coming of our Lord, to live out the truth and to love people. We need to pray for skillful balance in love. I'm tired of hearing pastors give sermons on love and it's never right to not be loving. And their definition of that is to say, it always has to be just affirming. No, loving can be denying. Lord, give us that perfect balance. I don't know, it's getting late, but I'll do a quick, you guys want a real quick Israel update? Real quick, real quick. I know it's getting late, so I'll be quick about that. In fact, I'll make a nice segue from LGBTQ to Israel. You ready for this? Did you see 30,000 people marched in Israel yesterday? 30,000 people, Jewish people marching in Jerusalem, pride parade under tight security, but without incident. Tens of thousands of Israelis. Israel is probably second only to the United States in pro-LGBTQ, which is interesting to me. You might say, well, but they're God's chosen people. How could that be? No, remember they're gathered in unbelief. They're still the bones and there's no breath in them. People think that we're pro-Israel because they're amazing people and they're so good. No, that's not why we're pro-Israel. We're pro-Israel because they're God's chosen people and he has a plan for these people. And when will the Jews, this makes sense to me, because God's wrath is gonna be poured out on a Christ-rejecting sinful world, but it's also the tribulation's gonna be to shake up the nation of Jews, and they need a shake up right now, because they're mostly atheists in Tel Aviv, and they're unbelievers. So 30,000 people, 2,000 police, it was quite a deal. The sad thing is the secularization of Israel, one of the studies that came out recently, this was an all Israel news article, Jews giving up on Messiah, shocking new survey finds nearly half of Israeli Jews don't believe Messiah will ever really come to earth. This is a new thing. This is a fairly new phenomena. The Jews who once, they invented the idea of a Messiah coming in the Old Testament Bible. Now half Jews are saying, yeah, it's never gonna happen. They're not even looking for a Messiah. They're gonna see Jesus during the tribulation period and realize, oh, that was our Messiah. We've done studies on that. Nearly half of all Israelis have given up believing the Messiah is coming in the future. By the way, this is the narrative the Bible said would happen too. Blindness in part has happened to Israel, Romans 9, 10, and 11. But I can't leave without saying, I probably should have done a whole process update on this topic. Is Israel gonna go to war with Iran? I've been saying this for years, we've been talking about it for years, but oh boy, there's a lot of people that are saying, watch out. Israel right now is doing these massive drills, huge. In fact, this was just the 29th, a few days ago, IDF launches major drill focused on preparing for all out multi-front And what's it called? Iron fist, I think is their drill that they're calling it. But basically two week long drill across the country. And again, as I've mentioned in earlier prophecy updates, they're training for a multi-front war because Israel is surrounded by enemies, surrounded by enemies. And there's hubbub, there's word on the street that Hezbollah is mounting up more weapons. The Iranians are supporting Hezbollah, Hamas. There's a bunch of enemies. All the way around Israel, they've got enemies of Israel. So the IDF sent troops from the Standing Reserve Army. Nearly all units would participate in this exercise. It was a firm hand is what it's called. firm hand over the next two weeks. So they're doing that. A lot of people believe Israel's gonna act. Israel's been giving fair warning to the world. We have a right to defend ourselves. We have a right to blow up Iran and their nuclear capabilities. And they've been saying that now for quite a while. The question is, when's that gonna happen? And you say, well, what does that have to do with the Bible and Bible prophecy so much? Iran and Russia are tied together. All the players of the Gog Magog War could be dragged into this conflict. I mean, the players are right there, right at the borders of Israel, Russia, Turkey, Syria, Iran, and even Sudan now, and others that are starting to posture. These are all fulfilling the precursor to what the Bible says of Ezekiel 38 war, Gog Magog war. Also the Isaiah 17 prophecy where Damascus is going to be leveled. Damascus has never been completely destroyed. It's the oldest city in the world. But there's coming a time where it's gonna be completely uninhabitable. And I believe that could happen really soon. Israel's been bombing the daylights out of Damascus, even the last few weeks. All that needs to happen is for one of those, you know, rockets, they've shot like Katyusha type rockets and all these rockets that are just lobbing into Israel, but they're not super high tech. Once some of those higher tech rockets from Iranian military goes over the border of Israel, the Jews have said, if that happens, we will make Damascus a parking lot. And that usually means something bigger than what they've done so far. Maybe even a nuclear detonation to wipe out the city of Damascus. That's where the Iranians are setting up shop right now. And the Jews are bombing them. Every time they bring more weapons in, the Jews bomb them. But there's going to come a point of no return where the Jews, I think very well in near future, could Isaiah 17 it and level Damascus. So the news just kind of keeps going, mounting tensions between Israel, Iran, herald possible military showdown. That's at the top of the news in the Middle East right now. And all the generals are meeting, Netanyahu and the generals are all meeting in a kind of an uncharacteristically consistent way that nobody's seen thus far. They really do believe the Israelis are ramping up and getting ready for a major multi-front attack. preemptive attack on these nations. So definitely keep your eye on that. When that stuff happens, who knows what's gonna happen. That could be sort of the catalyst that springs the rest of the end times prophetic issues, springs them into gear. So you always gotta keep your eye on Israel, the epicenter of all things Bible prophecy. So there you have it, quick update on Israel. And also, man, I pray the Lord will give you a wisdom. for Pride Month, and how do we as Christians live? Love, live the truth, and also, what was the third one? Look up. Thank you. See, I needed your help on that one. Well, Lord, we do, we do that. Lord, we look up for our redemption does draw near. Lord, we thank you that we have the hope of your return, that for us, it's not about here and now, but it's about eternity with you. So we have the hope of heaven. Lord, I pray that as we live in these days where the LGBTQ community is militant and angry and people are super opinionated, Teach us, Lord, how to be loving. We know the world will misconstrue love as hate. But Lord, I know that that's the way of the enemy to cause deception and lies, but I pray that the church would not be afraid to love even when it hurts, that we'd not be afraid to speak the truth. in love, Lord, give us that perfect balance and forgive us, Lord, for that sloppy handling of love and just embracing the sin as well as the sinner, Lord. We wanna be wise, wise as serpents, harmless as doves. Give us that perfect balance, Lord, and we pray that you'd protect these people that have heard this message, Lord, as no doubt, as we attempt to love people the way you would have us love. that could be fuel for more hatred. Give us wisdom, Lord. I pray you'd bless these, your people. May our light so shine, even under scrutiny and persecution even, may our light so shine before all men. So bless these people, may it bring good fruit tonight, this time in Prophecy Update, we pray in Jesus' name, amen.